


A Tale of Three Destinies: Heirs of an Empire

by Dalastjedi



Series: Tales of Three Destinies [1]
Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Bipolar Exo, Canon-divergent story, Deep Lore, Destiny, Destiny - Freeform, Earth, F/F, F/M, Gen, House of Wolves, Legends, Mars, Minor homosexuality, Non-Canon Abilities, Serious story with some memes, The Cabal, The Dark Below, The Hive - Freeform, The Moon - Freeform, Venus - Freeform, lore expansion, the fallen - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-05
Updated: 2019-05-13
Packaged: 2019-05-18 11:57:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 68,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14852319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalastjedi/pseuds/Dalastjedi
Summary: A Warlock with a mania for understanding - zealously loyal to a cult, a Hunter with a vendetta - determined above all else to reclaim the frontier, and a Titan with a damaged mind - unaware of his past traumas kept at bay by a close friend.When fate brings these three Guardians together, their fire will burn brighter than ever before. But, it will be up to them if that fire becomes a roaring flame or burns itself out, and leaves them in the dark.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: I just wanted to clarify where in the Destiny 1 timeline these events take place before things get on their way. For the moment, the events that follow will take place just after the conclusion to The Dark Below and will lead up to the House of Wolves and beyond.
> 
> This story initially started out as a crackpot for me and my Fireteam, but it eventually developed well enough that I figured, hey, why not?
> 
> Expect the next update to be on this Friday, at the latest.

**112 Kilometres south of the European Dead Zone…**

Across a barren wasteland of scorched earth, ether-saturated soil and dense clusters of vegetation struggling for life within limited space and feasible soil, a lone figure covered in a cloak took his time walking along a rise in the ground. From a distance, one wouldn’t be able to spot the figure with the naked eye, as he was shrouded by a shoulder-high yellowish-green fog of noxious gasses. 

In the distance, several other figures scuttled along the desolate grounds in pairs or groups, but they paid no attention to the lone figure and he paid them no mind in return. Unlike the scavengers that scoured the area for anything worth taking or eating, the lone traveller had a destination in mind.

* * *

“Incoming open channel broadcast from the Vanguard.” the Hunter’s Ghost said just as the Guardian reached the top of the small hill he was hiking up.

“Do we have to? We’re like, five clicks from that damaged Sparrow Transmat.” the Hunter whined as he pulled back his amber and brown-patterned hood in order to increase his peripheral vision, making a quick scan of the barren fields for enemies.

“Vanguard has this one listed as ‘High Priority’ and ‘To Any Guardians in the Area’.” His Ghost replied, appearing next to his head, it’s single blue eye blinking twice. “It’s still your call though.”

The Hunter took in a long, deep breath of the air purified by his helmet’s filters before letting out a long, drawn out groan, tilting his head as far backwards as he could while shouldering his pulse rifle. “Fine, relay it to me and point me in the right direction.” he finally said, pulling his hood back up as the Ghost appeared and flew in front of him.

“The short version would be that a Hive Seeder just recently crashed in No Man’s land. The Tower is worried that the Hive might gain another foothold on Earth, especially since there’s no strong Fallen presence here to deter them, unlike in other regions where the Hive have tried to swallow up.” the Ghost explained as it turned in a certain direction as a waypoint appeared in the Hunter’s field of vision, showing the location of the Hive Seeder.

“Nine clicks away!” the Hunter exclaimed as he stared at the estimated distance above the waypoint. Pausing for just a moment, the Guardian swung his head back and forth between the two waypoints in his head-up-display. “Ghost, is there a chance that we’d somehow arrive there faster if I made it to the Transmat, repaired it and rode a Sparrow the extra fourteen clicks?”

“Not even a Warlock could make sense of that.” his Ghost replied monotonously as it vanished in a flash of light. “Better get moving, Guardian.” the Hunter heard the Ghost’s voice through his communicator.

With a sigh, the Hunter took off down the hill, boots sliding over scorched earth as he made his way through what was once a lush field of grass and trees - or so he was told. Now, all that remained was a blackened patch of dirt, small patches of grass separated by ground scorched by lightning and plasma, each patch of charred soil another scar that revealed how many battles the Fallen have waged over this territory.

As a result of the constant skirmishes held here, the air here had been rendered un-breathable, as the poisonous smell of vaporised Fallen flesh and various fuel emissions made most life turn away from the challenge of living in this environment. It only seemed fitting, in the Hunter’s mind, that this place be reduced to an uninhabitable wasteland by war, as many wars had been fought on its surface long before the Traveler arrived.

According to the Warlocks, this place used to be known as Italy, and while he was reluctant to believe anything the Warlock’s could only speculate, the Hunter assumed that there had to be some truth to the claim as the Titans now referred to this place as the Italian No Man’s Land.

There was a lot of history here, and their food was supposedly delicious.

As he ran, the Hunter’s dull brown and white armour caught the light of the sun at certain angles, which hung high above the scorched ground. The dull colours that the rest of his armour exhibited contrasted sharply with the cherry-red helmet he wore under his brown hood, which had yellow arcs curving towards each other.

The pulse rifle he held in both his hands bore the markings of a Häkke-made weapon, while the fusion rifle strapped to his back did not have any Foundry markings, and instead shone a shade of cobalt.

“We should probably send out a response to let the Vanguard know we’re on the job.” his Ghost recommended as he leaped clear over a fissure in the ground, it’s form having melded with his Light for ease of travel.

“Yeah, we should.” the Hunter muttered to himself quickly before placing his fingers to the side of his helmet and speaking into the built-in communicator. “This is Gunslinger Gull, responding to the open Vanguard broadcast from the Italian No Man’s Land. Will investigate the nearby Hive threat and dispatch any three-eyed slime-sucking parasites with extreme prejudice if necessary.” He turned to face where his Ghost might be if it were in its tangible form. “Let’s go hunt some monsters.”

* * *

**35 Kilometres away…**

“Are we getting any closer?” The Titan hollered at the top of his Exo-vocal cords as he sprinted through the streets of a long-forgotten town. Derelict buildings covered in mould and plant-life littered either side of the broken road as the Guardian continued his relentless Light-fuelled sprint, his heavy feet making loud, sharp crunches and cracks whenever he stepped on a patch of broken glass.

“We haven’t been getting closer for the past two hours!” his Ghost responded as he continued to sprint forward with his head looking into the sky above. “Will you stop already? We’ve wandered into the middle of nowhere.”

“But this is where that Fallen Skiff flew off!” The titan replied as they passed through the township and continued on into the barren, crag-filled Italian No Man’s Land.

“That Fallen Skiff warped away to who knows where as soon as it flew off! It’s long gone!” Though it was rare for Ghosts to be made with a strong personality that rivalled that of a stubborn Titan on their quests to find their Guardians, there are some cases where Ghosts develop a sort of an attitude and a knack for snappy comebacks. These Ghosts could often be found floating about the Tower, joining in conversation with the various factions and protectors of the Last City. “Slow down or I’ll break your legs myself!” And make no mistake, they made for some interesting conversations.

“I’ll catch up to it eventually.” The Titan breathed out confidently as he never broke his stride. “It’ll tire out before me.”

To the Titan’s surprise however, his radar began lighting up with enemy signatures further ahead. “Heads up, we’ve got a couple of Shanks on patrol out here.” his Ghost told him.

Just as the Ghost had foretold, a pair of Shank drones hovered around from behind a rusted truck’s trailer, the vehicle having sunken into the ground after years of wear and tear. Instantly, the Titan changed the course of his sprint and sped directly towards the Fallen drones.

They detected him a second too late as the Titan landed his first Stormfist on the closest one, disintegrating it in a flash of Arc energy before following it up with another punch from his free hand. The Shank fell to pieces with a single hit, its compressor tumbling across the ground with a hiss of gas.

“Oh, thank the Traveler we stopped.” the Titan’s Ghost appeared at his side after a moment. The Ghost had a bronze-coloured shell that gleamed with a dull shine in the sun, and had a unique eye that glowed red instead of blue. “Now, before you take off again, I should warn you in advance that we entered a ‘No Fly’ zone a couple kilometres back. That means, the further back we go, the longer and harder it’ll be to Transmat back to orbit.” the Ghost explained.

“Ok,” The Titan acknowledged, turning his head away after a couple of seconds. The Guardian was not wearing a helmet, and had not been for the past few months after he took off his first helmet and couldn’t figure out which side was front and back. Instead, the Exo just forewent the idea of a helmet, and let his white and blue chrome plating brave the harsh conditions of Earth and beyond. “Wait, why is it a ‘No Fly’ zone?”

Letting out a sigh, the Ghost spun in a small circle on its spot before responding. “Because the Fallen have been fighting over this spot of land for a long time, and records show that most ships that fly through here have been intercepted and shot down by Fallen Skiffs and Ketches. Apparently if they can’t have it, they’re reluctant to let us have it either.”

“Ok,” He replied as he rubbed his metal chin with one hand, deep in thought. “So what do we do now?”

“Now?” parroted the Ghost. “How about we go back the way we came, get out of the ‘No Fly’ Zone, Transmat back to the Tower, and _not_ run around like a headless Vex Goblin with the-” The Ghost’s rant was suddenly halted as it turned to the side, staring off into the distance.

“Uh, Copperhead?” The Titan asked, calling the Ghost by its nickname. “What’s going on?”

“Shh.” Copperhead scolded quickly before turning away from the Guardian and expanding its shell to hone in on a frequency. “Ok, yeah. That was an open channel broadcast from the Tower. Apparently there’s some Hive trouble further into the No Man’s Land and the Vanguard wants any available Guardians to respond, ASAP.” The Ghost turned back to face the Titan directly. “You up for it?”

The Titan simply held out its empty hands as Copperhead materialised an auto rifle into his grasps. “Look, if there are pottery monsters lurking about on my planet, you can count on Beta Tauri-1337 to take care of them.” he said, striking a pose with his rifle slung onto one shoulder.

“Less posing, more moving - the Hive isn’t going to stop itself.” Copperhead reminded as he dematerialised into light, giving Beta the motivation he needed to get into high gear.

With his dull urban camouflage-coloured armour and tattered mark, Beta blended into the barren fields and desolate rocks quite well – _if_ he moved stealthily. In the experience of every Guardian, there was nothing stealthy about a Titan running at full speed with his Should Charge ready.

However, discretion hardly meant anything to Beta while he was moving at his top speed, carrying with him the forward momentum of a freight train.

* * *

**44 Kilometres away…**

At the centre of a one-hundred and fifty metre crater in the Earth rested the Hive Seeder; the nose of the spear-shaped vessel still giving off heat-waves even if it was partially buried in the dirt. Rocks that had been blown apart by the force of the impact were still hot, many of them glowing red-hot. Already, Hive Thralls and Acolytes were beginning to pour out of the Seeder and had begun digging out the start of an underground tunnel system.

Atop the rim of the crater, a Warlock stood with her scout rifle at her side while she used her free hand to remove the helmet covering her head. The light of the sun made her light-blue skin seem to radiate light while her neck-length dark-blue hair reflected no light as she shook it out, her form casting a long shadow behind her that made her look even more menacing. The Guardian took a deep breath of the air with her eyes closed, trying to hone her focus on the task at hand. While poisonous, a few deep breaths of the air here wouldn’t cause her to collapse instantly, though the rancid smell of the poisonous gases in the air was, itself, overwhelming to the senses.

“Looks like we’ve got about six minutes before the Hive numbers boom out of control.” The Warlock said to herself. “By then it’ll take a fireteam to stand against them. No doubt the Tower noticed the Seeder fall from the sky.”

Her Ghost materialised by her head a second later. “The Vanguard have already sent out an open-channel broadcast to all Guardians in the area to try and destroy it.”

“Good.” she said with a neutral expression. “The increased numbers will undoubtedly make our chances of survival better.” The Warlock’s neutral expression was broken for a second by a small cough, the toxic fumes in the air finally getting to her.

“May I remind you that the Tower doesn’t know we’re out here? If we dive down too deep into the cave the Hive have dug out, we stand the chance of being buried by the Guardians on the way.” Her Ghost warned.

“Well then,” she breathed out, slipping her umber helmet over her head. “We’d better do this quick - the Cult’s counting on us.” gripping the rifle with both bright-green gloves, the Warlock made a short leap into the crater and began sliding down the slope of dirt. Her red, yellow and blue robes only covered one shoulder as she dug her dark-brown boots into the igneous dirt in order to slow her descent.

“You know, you’re not the only member of the FWC, right?” The Ghost asked as it dematerialised to protect itself.

“No.” she agreed as a smirk crossed her lips just as an Acolyte noticed her presence. “But I am one of the few not afraid to get my hands dirty.” As if to make her point, she reached out when the Acolyte raised its weapon to grab it by the wrist, pulling it closer before smacking it over the head with the butt of her rifle and blowing it to pieces with a single hand-gesture.

The noise she made caught the attention of the rest of the Hive-spawn in the crater, who growled and hissed at her threateningly. In response, the Warlock smirked under her helmet while readying her gun. “Looks like Hell’s come for us.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> First impressions are always important, and what makes a better first impression than meeting under life-or-death circumstances - where one's true personality is laid bare for all to see.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Before we move on to the chapter, I wanted to point out that a last-minute change was made to the title and summary, for those of you who've been here from the beginning. It only just occurred to me how long the story would drag out if I went through with the original plan for the plot, so I decided to break it up into several stories to make it more...episodic.
> 
> With that, I can already estimate that Heirs of an Empire will run on for about 15-20 chapters, which I guess makes it one of the shortest stories I've written. But this is the first part of a saga I intend to finish, so you can expect more from this series.

**Crash-site H-34: Hive Seeder ship…**

With a practiced motion and precision, Gull reached for the crooked knife at his side and hurled it at the nearby Hive Knight. The blade stuck in the Knight’s shoulder and caused the large creature to stagger backwards for a second before bellowing at the Hunter.

However, a second later, the knife burst into flames which engulfed the walking cadaver, causing it to flail about in an attempt to put out the solar energy-fuelled fire burning through its armour. Gull’s fingers slid over the frame of his Häkke rifle as he raised it to eye-level and found the forward grip with his knife-hand. Squeezing on the trigger in quick taps, the Hunter unloaded a total of twelve shots at the Knight as it tried to cleave him in half with its ancient sword, before falling to the ground in a pile of ashes.

“Tsk. No engram this time.” Gull said bitterly while reloading his pulse rifle.

“I’m sure there’ll be plenty more of them where we’re going.” his Ghost reminded him as the Guardian slapped a new magazine into his rifle and continued walking towards the rim of the crater.

Smoke and steam still rose from the rocks and chunks of soil kicked up by the Hive Seeder’s crash landing as Gull took a knee at the very edge of the crater, raising a hand to shade his visor from the glare of the sun.

Already, Gull could tell that the Hive infection was festering as a dangerous rate. Glowing Hive crystals stuck out at odd angles from various holes in the ground dug out by the various Thrall that now stalked the inside of the crater. Around them, Acolytes and Hive Knights were working to move various strange capsules from the Seeder into the tunnels, likely fuel or food for their spawn.

“Looks like they’ve already set up.” Gull thought out loud. “We can get down there and clear out the crater, but we need to make sure that the Seeder is completely destroyed.  After that, it’s just a matter of causing the tunnel systems to collapse on top of them, and that _should_ kill most of them –hopefully starving the rest.” Lowering his hand to feel the smooth metal of his fusion rifle, Gull mulled over his options on how to best go about the task before an idea came to him. “Ghost, those capsules they’re carrying down there have explosive capabilities, right?”

“Yes, the capsules are filled with some kind of solid Hive energy capable of powering their machines.” The Ghost said right before materialising above Gull’s shoulder. “It shouldn’t take more than a little physical disruption to set them off, though I can only estimate how big the blast radius will be from previous experiences.”

“Huh. I always assumed that their machines ran on space magic.” The Hunter mused to himself.  “Can you track their signatures – mark them on my HUD?” he directed the question towards the floating form by his side.

A moment passed by as the Ghost’s various parts turned and twisted while its light changed in brightness. “Yes. I just reconfigured to pick up their energy signatures. Marking them for you now.”

Blinking twice, Gull waited until the waypoints stopped appearing in his vision, identifying the various clusters of capsules that gave off enough energy for his Ghost to pick out. Already, a plan was forming in his mind as he noticed that there was a large cluster of them inside the Seeder itself, while several others were being moved around in the tunnels below.

“Tunnels go deeper than I thought.” Gull muttered as he saw the estimated distance from some of the capsules go up to three-hundred metres. “Alright, new plan; we set off some capsules inside the Seeder to stop the source, then move on to the tunnels and blow up whatever they already have loaded in there.”

“Whatever you do, do it quickly.” His Ghost warned. “The Hive have a tendency to multiply rapidly once they have their hatcheries built – the longer we wait, the more we’ll have to face.”

Gull was about to respond, when the sound of the earth cracking underneath him brought his attention to two rising mounds of earth around him. Before he could even ask, two Thrall’s poked their heads out of the dirt and wailed at him, their claws reaching out to grab him by the leg and trip him over.

The Gunslinger reacted quicker than they could strike at him, jumping backwards before firing a burst of rounds into each of their heads, causing them to collapse into piles of ashes. “No joke.” Gull said, turning his head to the Ghost at his side, who looked quite fearful. “We’d better watch our backs.” No sooner had he said those words that the sound of a rock being kicked aside came from behind them, which made the Hunter pivot on his heel to face his next foe.

However, what he saw surprised him.

Standing on the rim of the wide crater was another Guardian, kicking a couple stones down its side and watching them tumble down. From the looks of it, he was part of the Titan Order, and wore no helmet for some reason, revealing himself to be an Exo. His metal face had a base coat of white paint, which was decorated along the sides by light-blue streaks that formed vertical patterns.

The Titan heard Gull turn towards him, and looked in his direction for a moment before turning the rest of his body. A moment of tension washed over the two, though Gull didn’t know why and neither did the Titan. However, they were both waiting for the other to break the silence first, for whatever reason.

The Titan raised a single hand and waved it to the Hunter. “Hello.” It said in greeting.

A sigh of relief passed through the Hunter’s air purifiers as he lowered his rifle to his side. “Titan, I assume you’re here about the Vanguard’s message?” Gull asked in greeting. He could become more formally acquainted with the Titan once the Hive were taken care of. As far as he was concerned, the Hive must be contained to Luna – nowhere else in the Solar System.

“Oh no. I’m here about the pottery infestation.” The Exo replied while slowly walking over towards Gull.

“The…what?” Gull asked, genuinely confused at this point.

“He means the Hive.” A Ghost said before materialising next to the Titan. The Ghost… _his_ Ghost had an unusual red light for an eye instead of a blue one. Now, Gull had seen quite a number of different Ghosts in his time – his own Ghost sported a grey shell with larger crests on top and below its front, but he had never seen a Ghost with a red light before. It made the Ghost look fierce, which made the Hunter both intimidated by its stare and interested in its origin. “Sorry, he’s had a long day, and, well, me even longer.”

“Ok…” Gull droned as he considered the options before him now. Initially, he thought he might have to blow out the Seeder first in order to stem the flow of Hive soldiers, but now… “Anyway, I could use your help with something.”

“Does the something involve destroying the Hive Seeder?” the Titan’s Ghost asked him.

“Indeed it does.” Gull said, extending a hand. “Gunslinger Gull.” He greeted.

“Beta Tauri,” The Exo replied, gripping his hand firmly. “-1337. What do you need me to punch?” he asked enthusiastically.

“Actually, I need you to run a diversion for me while I blow up the Seeder and their underground tunnels.” Gull reaffirmed as he grabbed a Swarm Grenade off his belt.

“Why can’t I blow up the things?” Beta asked with what could only be described as an Exo’s best attempt at a pout.

Gull was about to reply and state that his training as a Hunter made him quicker and nimbler, key aspects in order to swiftly get down there and finding a good place the set off the capsules. However, Beta’s Ghost beat him to it. “Do you really want to go down into the tunnels full of Hive-spawn?”

A second passed and Beta’s blank expression turned back to face the Hunter. “The Ghost has a point.” He stated neutrally.

Gull was about to add something else when the screams coming up from the bottom of the crater caught his attention. The Hive had noticed them and were beginning to send waves of Thralls and Acolytes their way. “Never mind, we need to get a move on.” He stated, shaking his head as he shook the words on his mind out of his thoughts.

Both Ghosts dematerialised in an instant. “Ready whenever you are.” The Titan’s Ghost spoke over a personal radio frequency.

Nodding his head once, the Hunter first tossed the Swarm Grenade ahead in order to disrupt a squad of charging Thrall before leaping into the crater, sliding down its side and firing at any Thralls or Acolytes that were too close. Purple blasts from Acolyte Shredders passed close to Gull, but only one or two hit him, breaking against his shielding.

Following close behind him, Beta Tauri was spraying fire from his auto rifle at any and all Hive around him. Since he first encountered them, the Titan has been convinced that the Hive are actually evil, possessed terracotta pottery, as evidenced by the stone-like armour they left behind when he killed them. Some have tried, but no one could convince him otherwise; not the Cryptarchs, not the Vanguard – no one.

As he ran down the side of the crater, Beta tried to find sure footing in the loose soil to kick off into a sprint. Three quarters down the slope, the Guardian was able to brace his foot against a large rock and push off it, gaining the momentum he needed to break into a run.

At this point, Beta was moving at three steps for every one step the Hunter took. With Copperhead’s aid, the Exo was able to swap out his auto rifle for a shotgun that materialised out of Light as he smashed an Acolyte to pieces with a Shoulder Charge.

Swinging around by ninety degrees, Beta then unloaded a couple gauges from his shotgun into any Hive that got too close to him, reaching around once to punch a flanking Thrall with Stormfist. The Hive-spawn’s body flew backwards a couple steps before completely evaporating into Arc lightning. Much to his shock, a second and third Thrall followed directly after its dead comrade, taking its place with many more on the way.

With his Stormfist still recharging, the Titan instead swung his shotgun around in his grip to press the barrel against the nearest Thrall’s chest, blasting the creature into a shower of ash and darkness before using the recoil of the shot to reverse his grip on the weapon and club the next Thrall on the head with the end of it. As it fell to the ground with a single hit, Beta moved in to finish the job by stomping its head into a pile of ash.

“Titan, get down!” Beta heard Gull suddenly shout over the communications link, a command he didn’t hesitate to follow as he dropped into a crouch while he reloaded several shells of synthetic ammunition into his shotgun.

While that happened, Gull swapped out his pulse rifle for his fusion rifle, charging up a bolt of Arc energy and firing it into the chest of the Hive Knight that had crept up behind Beta with its Cleaver raised and ready to strike.

The plasma bolt scorched the hard bone armour of the Knight and caused it to stagger backwards as it aimlessly swung its sword into the ground, missing the Titan by a large margin.

The Hunter was about to swap back for his pulse rifle to finish the job on the Knight, but Beta worked quicker and stood back up to punch his fist into the Hive-spawn’s chest, as reluctant as he was to touch those things. Because of the lightning, the bone had cracked and became brittle, shattering under the powerful force of the Titan’s fist. Pulling back to allow the Knight a moment to stagger, Beta removed his auto rifle and pressed its barrel to the Knight’s exposed chest, squeezing down on the trigger and not stopping until the rounds passed right through the creature.

“Nice work, Beta Tauri.” Gull complimented as he rushed past him, swapping between his rifles as he did. “Just keep them distracted for a few minutes. If I’m not done in three minutes, call for reinforcements!” the Hunter called out as he ducked under the swing of an Acolyte and swung his arm around its neck, holding it in a choke-hold as he stabbed its gun-arm with his knife. With a roar of pain from the Acolyte, the gunslinger twisted the knife about to control the creature’s aim, causing it to fire its Shredder at other Hive-spawn, the Void rounds burning off the armour of the Acolytes and searing the scaly flesh of Thralls.

“Ok, can do!” Beta called out as Gull tore his knife across the Acolyte’s chest, causing its lifeless body to drop to the floor as he began his descent into the lower tunnel systems. “I’ll just be up here…with the pottery monsters…while you go down there…with the many, many more pottery monsters.” A clawed hand reached up from the ground as the Titan spoke, grabbing him by the leg.

The Exo was suddenly gripped with panic as he tried to pull his leg free from the Thrall’s grasp, pulling the entire Thrall out of the ground and kicking it into a swarm of its allies. While they were clearly disoriented by the Thrall that had been thrown into them, Beta _needed_ to be sure that they were adequately disorientated and primed a Flash grenade, hurling into the crowd in front of him as another Thrall jumped on his back from behind, causing him to let out a panicked scream.

* * *

**Crash-site H-34: Directly under the impact crater…**

In the tunnels dug out by the Hive, green crystals stuck out of the walls at odd angles, providing some manner of illumination in the dark tunnels. After descending down the first tunnel system, Gull found himself in what looked more like an underground cavern, with spires and columns supporting the roof above, which stretched up for several metres and could likely fit an Ogre.

The Hunter made a quick scan of the environment, spotting several Hive-spawn – fast approaching, a few miscellaneous machine parts and several racks loaded with Hive weapons. Next to the racks laid the large, explosive capsules, glowing an ominous hue of blood-orange.

The only thing standing between them and Gull now were the swarm of angry Hive headed his way.

Priming another Swarm grenade, the Hunter tossed it forward and allowed for the seeking bolts of Solar energy to seek out a target as he ran towards them with the barrel of his pulse rifle hot from firing so many bursts in such a short time period. As he neared a Knight with a Boomer, Gull quickly focussed on the ground that he stood on and leapt clear over the Knight, boosting himself higher into the air with a second jump. Bolts of Arc and Void energy followed him as he went, but Gull was able to avoid most of them while turning around in mid-air to fire several shots back at the Hive cluster.

His shields were down to half by the time he hit the ground and took off towards the capsules with a sprint. His cape fluttered in his wake as quickly closed the distance, bolts of energy from Hive weaponry constantly burning through his shields and cloak as he did.

“Ghost, hold this for me!” Gull shouted in his helmet as he followed through with the motion of slinging his pulse rifle on his back. Instead, the rifle disappeared in a flash of light as he reached forward with both hands to grab the capsule. “Right, now I just got to find somewhere to blow this up.” The gunslinger muttered to himself as he looked around the cavern for a major supporting column.

Seeing none as a Boomer blast hit dangerously close to him, Gull took a turn and sprinted down into the next tunnel system, which led him to a cavern with an even higher roof.

However, this also led him to what seemed to be the supporting column to this cave – possibly to the entire cave system.

The column was at least a metre and a half thick and was being reinforced with Hive chitin by Thralls and Acolytes. Multiple arches and bridges that led up to other tunnels connected to the central column, using it as a transitory point where they all met. With his target in sight, all Gull had to do was plant the capsule somewhere and hope that the explosion was large enough.

Dodging fire from the enemy, Gull began running in a wide circle around the column, unable to fight back with both hands on the capsule. As luck would have it, the Hunter came across another pile of similar capsules by the side of the column, and just gingerly tossed the one he had in his hands with it.

With his hands free, he reached for the knife that materialised at his hip and threw it at an Acolyte in his peripheral vision that had been shooting at him, the blade hitting it square in one of its three eyes. Now, all he had to do was get some distance, summon his Golden Gun, and bury this tunnel system.

That was, of course, before his Ghost spoke up.

“Hang on! I’m picking up a friendly signature coming up from one of those tunnels.” His Ghost marked on his HUD exactly where he was talking about as Gull ducked behind a stalagmite.

“That’s impossible! Who in their right mind-” he asked just as the figure backed out of the single person-sized tunnel. With a sigh, Gull hung his head back. “Never mind.”

Slowly backing out of the tunnel was a Warlock in Future War Cult robes, brown boots and gloves. Her helmet had an odd amber and cobalt colour scheme, while her figure suggested that it was a woman underneath those robes. At first, Gull didn’t understand why she had her hands out in front of her instead of her weapon, but he had a feeling that the Cursed Thrall following closely in front of her may have had something to do with it.

“She’s probably far away enough from it.” The Hunter muttered to himself as he swung his pulse rifle around to put four bullets into the glowing Thrall’s head, causing it to explode with a blast of cursed magic.

The explosion caught the Warlock off-guard and caused her to stagger backwards in surprise as she looked around for the cause to the explosion. When her visor turned in the direction of the Hunter, Gull gave a small wave from behind cover, inadvertently attracting the attention of several other Hive creatures.

The Warlock’s shoulders visibly slumped before she had to dodge a few bolts of energy herself. Picking the scout rifle off her back, she returned fire while moving towards where the Hunter was hiding, dropping into a slide as she went. With a slight twist, the Warlock was able to turn her body mid-slide and hit the stalagmite next to Gull with her back.

“What the hell was that for?” the Warlock shouted at the Hunter as she poked her rifle over the cover that the stalagmites provided and take a few wild shots.

“Y’know, usually when someone saves your life, the first thing you say is ‘thank you’.” Gull replied, grunting as his shoulder was clipped by a bolt of Void power. _It had to be a Warlock,_ he thought to himself while lining up his sights with more Acolytes.

“I was trying to study it!” she snapped back as a Thrall rounded the corner of the stalagmite, which was met with a blast of fire from the Warlock’s palm.

“Typical.” Gull muttered to himself before standing out from behind cover to fire off a few shots at anything he could line up with his crosshair. “Didn’t you get the Vanguard’s memo? You’re not supposed to be studying the Hive here; you’re supposed to be killing them!”

A Knight from his left was able to sneak up without Gull’s notice, nearly cleaving his head off were it not for the blast of Solar energy from the Warlock’s fusion rifle. “If we understand how the Hive work,” rushing to Gull’s back, the Warlock pushed the Knight back a few steps with a blast of energy before unloading several shots into the Hive-spawn’s head, causing it to drop to the floor as its head shattered into pieces. “then we can find better ways to kill them.”

“Whatever. Science project’s over.” Focussing intently on the reserve of Light that had he had been building up for the past few hours, the gunslinger channelled that Light into the palm of his right hand, forming a Golden Gun out of nothing. “Get clear, I’m about to bury this place!” he shouted to the Warlock as he lunged out of cover. Gull didn’t bother to check on the Warlock as he unloaded the first shot of sunlight into a Hallowed Knight, causing it to stagger backwards as the light burnt away its thick armour.

The second shot was a lot more difficult to line up, as the Hive forces had built up right in front of where the capsules had been stacked. With a deep breath to still his aim, the Hunter fired right between two charging Thrall, hitting the pile of capsules by the column and causing an explosion that scattered Hive limbs and bits of rock all over the place as the column began crumbling to pieces.

The temptation to fire off the last shot was almost too great as Gull turned and made a break for the exit, catching a glimpse of the Warlock’s blue robes at the end of the tunnel. All around them, the tunnels and caverns began to collapse as smaller columns began to crumble and loose rocks fell from the ceiling. The Hunter didn’t even have enough time to grab the Engrams the crushed Hive dropped.

With the tunnel that led them back to the surface in sight, Gull fired off the last round in the gun’s chamber as a group of Acolytes began blocking his way out. The single shot caused the Acolyte it hit to violently explode, causing the others around it to stagger and make way for the Warlock, who blasted them to pieces with her scout rifle.

“She’s got…decent aim.” Gull mumbled to himself as he followed her out, making it the rest of the way with a double-jump as the tunnel threatened to cave in on him. As an experienced Hunter, he knew it was no easy feat to land precision shots while running _and_ avoiding falling debris.

The light of the sun that filtered through the shower of dust was getting dimmer and dimmer, but the Hunter made it out just as the roof of the tunnel collapsed, hitting the dirt floor hard and dropping his gun in his fall.

While the Hunter caught his breath, the Warlock dusted off her robes and muttered some curses spoken only by the Awoken in the Reef. Looking around her, there was a much larger mess of scattered Hive limbs than she remembered leaving when she first got here. Looking around, she quickly found the source of the increasing number of broken Thralls and scattered Engrams.

Beta Tauri was still deeply focussed on smashing two Thralls against one another when the tunnels collapsed, and hadn’t noticed the resurgence of the Hunter or the appearance of the Warlock. Or the fact that parts of the ground around the crater had sunk in slightly.

Not even the bolts of Void energy that came from the Acolytes standing behind him could deter his quest to crush a Thrall _with_ a Thrall. With as focussed on his task as he was, he hardly noticed that his shields had completely depleted even at Copperhead’s constant insistence.

Neither Acolyte really posed a great threat, especially when the Warlock had a fusion rifle ready to blast them apart.

As he finished pummelling the two Thrall against one another, Beta finally took note of the fact that most of the shooting had stopped – specifically the shooting at him. Dusting off his hands, he turned around and finally noticed the two other Guardians.

Standing where she was, the Warlock put her free hand on her hip and aimed the barrel of her Solar weapon at the ground, taking a moment to relax after the excitement of having almost been crushed. “Hey there.”

“Hello!” Beta called out, holding out a hand that was covered in bits of Thrall remains. “Beta Tauri, 1337.” He said while wiping his hand on his armour.

The Warlock made no move to accept the hand, but let out a huff of acknowledgement and tilted her head. “Mira Vuul.” Turning around on her heel, Mira spun to face the Hunter as he slowly rose back to his feet. “And what do they call you?”

With a few heavy breaths, the Hunter reached up to pull back his hood and press a series of buttons along his helmet that caused it to depressurise, letting out several puffs of gas. After allowing it the few seconds to depressurise, he unclasped the latches holding the helmet in place and removed it, revealing the grizzled, hardened face of a Human.

With their lifespan triple what it used to be before the Traveller’s arrival, Gull looked to be roughly one-hundred and fifty, with a head covered in trimmed grey hair and a neatly kept beard. Despite the colour of his hair, his face had more scars than they did wrinkles, as was a testimony to his activity in The Wilds. “Gunslinger Gull.” He introduced himself before shooting Mira a glare. “The Vanguard declared this place to be destroyed as soon as possible, what were you doing down there running experiments instead of blowing these things up?”

“I was going to get around to it, eventually.” Mira snapped back.

“Sure you were.” Gull said sarcastically as he slipped his helmet back on, having had enough of the toxic air outside.

“You don’t seem to have handled it that much better.” The Warlock responded.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“As I remember it, the Vanguard’s message asked any available Guardians to destroy the Seeder _and_ the Hive presence.”

“Yeah, well, what’s your point?” This time, Mira just gestured towards the intact Seeder, which Hive-spawn were still crawling out of and charging towards them.

Gull froze as he looked in its direction for a couple seconds before groaning out loud. “I forgot about the Seeder!”

“Well, since you’ve already caused a cave-in on this swarm of ‘Blood of Oryx’ Hive, we might as well finish the job.” The Warlock said while reloading her scout rifle. “This time, we do things my way.”

“Who put you-”

“I’ve studied Hive Seeders before – I know how they work. They all have a big weakness if you know where to look for it.” Mira explained as she fired in bursts at the approaching Thrall. “Not to mention, the cave-in you’ve caused is causing the Seeder to sink into the ground.” She said in a bubbly tone as they watched the Hive vessel sink a couple feet deeper into the ground. “If that thing goes underground, it’ll be a lot harder to destroy, so if we want to do this, you’d better follow my lead.”

Priming another Swarm grenade, Gull lobbed it forward into the swarm of approaching Thralls and Acolytes, which caused them to scatter as the bolts of Solar energy sought out targets. “…Fine.” He agreed, reluctantly, as he turned to the Titan on the opposite side of the Warlock. “Beta, are you in?”

The Exo didn’t hesitate before shrugging once. “Sure, so long as I don’t have to go in the Seeder…and get to keep the Engrams.”

“You don’t have to go in that thing – the plan requires one of us to run diversions on the outside.” Mira said while popping off a few more headshots. “And you can keep any Engrams that you can get your hands on.” After turning her head toward the Titan, she turned to the Hunter. “Try to keep up.” She said before taking off at a sprint.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed the chapter! The next one should be up no later than Monday, so subscribe to make sure you don't miss it. As always, constructive comments and criticism is always welcomed.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Guardians must race against time to destroy the Hive Seeder before it is buried beneath the earth - where they cannot reach it and where it will be allowed to fester.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Releasing this a bit on the early side of Monday, but I didn't feel like there was much to tweek for this chapter at this point. If you spot any mistakes or grammatical errors while reading it though, feel free to point them out in the comments. I'm always working to make all my stories the best they can be.
> 
> One other thing, if you're wondering when in the Destiny timeline Heirs of an Empire take place, it and every other sequel to it take place right after the Dark Below - say about a week after a Guardian Fireteam went and mopped up Crota's End. I won't say if any of the three were involved in Crota's End just yet, but it might be revealed down the line.

 

The ground surrounding the Hive Seeder continued to crack and collapse at different points, dragging the Seeder deeper with it. Soon, the malevolent Hive construct would be completely buried underground, sunken in like a splinter in the earth. When that happened, the Hive would have their new foothold on Earth as they dug out a new network of tunnels and breeding grounds, expanding their reach all across No Man’s Land until it became uninhabitable for a different reason.

Needless to say, the three Guardians didn’t have much time left.

Their only entry point into the Hive vessels were the openings on its sides, which were overflowing with Hive and getting smaller every minute the Seeder sunk deeper into the Earth.

The former was easily changed with a little suppressive fire from the Guardians as the wall of Hive-spawn that blocked their way was quickly thinned out under the combined firepower from the three Guardians. The latter, however, was not so easily fixed as none of them possessed the means to stop the _very_ heavy Hive vessel from sinking.

Eventually, it was a Solar grenade from Mira that cleared a path into the large Hive weapon, which Gull took advantage of as he dived for the opening with his fusion rifle out, turning any Thralls around him into sparks of Arc lightning and more than a handful of Engrams.

Mira was quick to follow the Hunter, while Beta Tauri remained outside, picking off any stragglers that were trying to either run away or burrow into the ground.

“On your left, two Thralls found a patch of soft dirt.” Copperhead quickly barked, directing the Titan as he fired burst after burst of rounds from his auto rifle. In mere seconds, the two Hive-spawn were reduced to ashes after a quick magazine swap.

“Man, we never get the easy job.” Beta complained as he threw a grenade at a cluster of Thralls and Acolytes running towards him.

“This isn’t the easy job?” his Ghost asked him rhetorically. “And running into the Hive Seeder is?”

“No, that’s the extra-extra difficult job. We got, like, the sorta-difficult-but-also-kinda-fun job.” Beta replied as his auto rifle ran out of ammo halfway through firing at an Acolyte, which he finished off by flipping his gun in his hands and using it like a bat.

Meanwhile, the Gunslinger and Sunsinger were struggling to clear out the interior of the Seeder, which was packed to the brim with Hive with more constantly pouring out of the crevices along its walls.

“I need a clearing to work here!” Mira yelled as she blasted back an Acolyte with a mystic force from her palm.

“Not that easy to do.” Gull replied as he threw one of his knives at a Thrall, hitting it square in the face. “Why don’t we just set off those capsules in the walls?” the Hunter asked as he swapped out the clip in his pulse rifle.

“Hive Seeders were built to survive a fall from space, meaning that the hull is extremely well-armoured. Those capsules wouldn’t do more than put a dent or a crack in this thing.” Mira replied while tossing another Solar grenade into an opening where Thralls were spawning out of. “What we need to do is to trigger a chain reaction with the Seeder’s core. But to do that, I need to get the core open.”

“Ok, where’s this ‘core’?” Gull asked, throwing a Swarm grenade at a Hallowed Knight that had walked in through one of the other openings in the Seeder. The seeking bolts of Solar energy did little to deter the Knight, however, and Gull was forced to move back until he came back-to-back with the Warlock.

“We’ve been dancing around it for the past couple seconds.” Mira indicating the spire in the centre of the room with a quick turn of the head. Only then did Gull realise that the spire constantly radiated a sickly green glow and hummed with an energy that flowed throughout the ship’s interior.

“Oh,” Gull mused as he unsheathed his knife, reversed his grip on it and thrust it into the skull of a Thrall that had been trying to sneak up from his side. “Alright, I’ve got an idea, but you’ll only get one shot at this.”

“One shot’s all I need.” Mira said while taking down a pair of Acolytes with carefully placed headshots, demonstrating her accuracy to the Hunter as she did.

Reluctant as he was to put any faith in the Warlock – or any Warlock for that matter, Gull has been a Guardian long enough to know that when it came down to it, they needed to work together to survive, and that the Warlocks could have good ideas, sometimes.

The two were instantly blasted onto their side by a salvo from the Hallowed Knight’s Boomer, rolling across the Seeder’s floor until they hit the walls of the construct.

“Right, you.” Gull muttered to himself as he got back on his feet, clutching his injured side. “Ghost, it’s time to pull out the big guns.” The Hunter spoke into his personal communicator as he closed his eyes for a second to focus on dematerialising his pulse rifle. In its place, a light machine gun materialised in his waiting hands as he pivoted on one foot to smack an Acolyte in the face with the barrel of the gun. Cocking the firing mechanism, Gull let loose a rain of bullets on anything with a red ‘Friend-or-Foe’ marker on it while the Knight continued to fire bolts from its Boomer at him, dropping Gull’s shields to low. Once all the nearby enemies had been taken care of, he focussed his fire on the Hallowed Knight, the force of each shot causing the Knight to stagger backwards until it raised a shield in front of it, protecting it momentarily.

“If you’re going to do something, you’d better do it before I run out of bullets.” He shouted over the thunderous sound of his machine gun as the Hallowed Knight’s shield disappeared and finally crumbled into a pile of ash after a few more shots.

Once Mira took a moment to allow her shields to regenerate, the Warlock quickly dematerialised her scout rifle before kicking of the wall, tackling into the Seeder’s shielded core. “Ghost, crack this thing open before we-” Mira was unable to finish her sentence as the Seeder violently shook for a second before she was overcome with the feeling of falling, for about three seconds. The whole time, Mira had a firm grip on the core as she tried not to get thrown about with the jerking motions of the Seeder, unlike the Hunter, who was thrown off his feet the second the shaking started. Looking out of the openings of the Hive construct, she felt a surge of panic course through her as she saw that they had already sunken halfway into the ground.

Sure, this wouldn’t be the first time she would die behind enemy lines, but something told her that being buried underground in a Seeder full of Hive would ruin the chances of a rescue before the Hive performed all sorts of experiments and torture on her Ghost, and then killed it. Undoubtedly, neither she nor her Ghost would survive the torture, and the thought got her excited in all the wrong ways.

The thoughts fuelled her curiosity to no end, but as exciting as experiencing Hive torture first-hand was, the Warlock already had her mind set on the fact that she still had so much more to learn before she finally took a crack at the Hive’s definition of ‘pain’. Gathering her strength, Mira summoned her Ghost forth and ordered it to cut out a section of the thick metal plating that covered the core.

After scanning for a suitable spot to begin its work, the Ghost quickly but carefully started to cut out a rectangular section of the core’s shielding with a focussed beam of energy. As this was happening, the Hunter was finding it increasingly difficult to fight the Hive on his own as the onslaught of Thrall came at him faster than he could reload his weapons.

“Warlock, whatever you’re doing, make it go faster!” he shouted at her as a Thrall leapt on top of him and ripped away a section of his hood with its sharp claws. Gull reached for his knife and stabbed the Thrall in the chest in retaliation, killing the skinny, eyeless alien with a twist of his blade as he got back to his feet and reloaded his machine gun. “In a couple of seconds this thing’s going to be six feet under – and it’s going to drag us down with it.”

“I’m trying!” Mira snapped back as she tried to pry the half of the cut-out that the Ghost had been able to cut through. However, because of a lack of Titan-like strength, the Warlock wasn’t able to do more than dislodge it by less than a centimetre. “Just keep the Hive off me!” Mira barely got her fingers out of the small wedge she made in time to blast an encroaching Acolyte with a shockwave from her palm.

“Don’t worry, I’m almost done. Just give me another nine seconds.” Her Ghost told her calmly.

“We don’t have nine seconds!” The Warlock yelled back. “We need to-” her sentence was cut off by the sound of the Seeder shaking as it sunk even deeper into the Earth. Dirt from the openings started pouring in and reduced the amount of room they had to work with. In the end, only one opening had enough space for them to exit out of – assuming that they made it.

“This is it.” Gull mumbled to himself as his heavy ammo ran dry and the Knight he had been fighting took the opportunity to charge towards him while a couple of Thralls grabbed him from behind, preventing him from summoning a weapon. “This is how I’m going down? This is one of the worst ways a Hunter can go!”

“This is not how I die.” Mira hissed through gritted teeth as she put all her strength into trying to ply the plating out. Her Ghost had cut out more than three quarters of the plating, yet she still didn’t have it in her to pry the thing open. “Looks like there’s only one option left.”

* * *

**Crash-site H-34: Crater surface…**

Outside the Seeder, Beta was going into a state of panic. “Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh! They’re sinking! What do we do? What do we do?” he exclaimed while frantically looking around the place and flailing his arms.

“Snap out of it!” Copperhead yelled as he materialised in front of him before jerking to one side and hovering back. “That was supposed to be a slap.” The Ghost stated blandly as it dematerialised again. “Look, you’re a Titan; the strongest kind of Guardian – out of the three. If you put your muscle – um, hydraulic fibres – to the task, they can solve a lot of problems.”

A moment passed by when the gears in Beta’s head began to turn, quite literally in fact, before an idea came to him. Firing off the last shell in his shotgun at an approaching Thrall, he tossed the gun aside, which dematerialised before it hit the floor, as he took off towards the Seeder at a sprint.

Yelling as he went and knocking any Hive out of his way, the Titan ran right up to the Seeder before digging his fingers into the reinforced metal of its hull, finding any groove or cracks that he could slip his fingers into.

“What the – no, Beta wait! This is crazy!” Copperhead warned, sounding quite frightened as Beta strained to pull the Seeder out of the ground, causing the ground beneath his feet to crack from the strain of the action.

“Need. More. Power.” The Exo strained to say as he lifted one corner of the Seeder off the collapsing ground, preventing it from sinking even further. “Can’t. Hold on. Much longer.”

“Beta, it’s not worth it. If we hold on much longer the ground under us is going to collapse too.” His Ghost explained as it materialised in front of him. “We’ll be dragged down with them!”

“Need. To give them. More time.” Beta exclaimed as he kicked out behind him, catching a Thrall that had been trying to sneak up behind him in the crotch. Though it didn’t seem like it, the Titan was actually bearing the weight of half the Seeder by holding on to it and lifting it slightly off the ground, only just preventing it from sinking.

“Behind you!” Copperhead screamed at him, causing Beta to dodge out of the way just as a Knight drove its Cleaver into the hull of the Seeder, stabbing the space Beta would have been in if he had not dodged out of the way.

Roaring at the Titan, the Knight tried to pull its sword out of the Seeder, but the weapon was firmly lodged into the construct’s dense hull. As such, the Knight relinquished its sword in favour of walking right up to Beta to attack him.

“Gun me.” The Titan told his Ghost as his auto rifle materialised in his free hand, only for it to get knocked away as the Knight delivered a solid punch to his side. “Gun me!” Beta shouted, holding out his other hand. His shotgun began materialising this time, but the Knight caused the Titan to lose his grip on that as well as its arm swung back and back-handed the weapon out of the Titan’s grip. “Gun me!” Beta yelled again a higher, more panicked pitch as he raised his fists to block the next punch.

“Yeah, that’s all the guns we have.” Copperhead stated neutrally. “Good luck!”

The Knight wound up its fists for another strike, but Beta was quicker and stepped out of the way of the Hallowed Hive. “Alright, we do this the old-fashioned way.” The Exo muttered before striking the Knight over the head with a solid Stormfist.

He was about to follow up the attack, but remembered that the Seeder was still sinking. “Oh, crap! Oh, crap! Oh, crap!” In that instance, Beta completely forgot about the Knight and went back to holding up the Seeder, using the Knight’s Cleaver as a point for leverage.

However, the Knight wasn’t as finished as either he or Copperhead believed, as it tackled him into the hull of the Seeder and began trying to bite his face off while its claws dug into the Exo’s armour.

“Ah! Ugly!” Beta shouted in panic as he unleashed a flurry of punches on the Knight that cracked apart its hard armour, fuelled by an unknown source of strength. The tide of the fight between them suddenly turned as the Knight recoiled in pain, giving Beta the chance he needed to grab the Knight by its shoulders and drive him through the hilt of the sword still stuck in the Seeder’s side, trapping him on his own weapon.

Beta breathed heavily to calm his nerves and overloaded sensory system. “That was a lot scarier a second ago.” It seemed the Titan spoke too soon, however, as a pack of Thralls jumped him from behind and pulled him to the ground, depleting what was left of his shields.

“Come on, Beta. Get up!” Copperhead yelled, but it fell on deaf ears as the Exo flailed in panic, batting away the claws and sharp teeth that attacked him and left bite marks in his armour. The Knight had also been able to dislodge itself from its Cleaver, at a great cost to its abdomen, and was now approaching the downed Guardian, seeking revenge as the Thrall pinned him to the ground.

In his state of panic and danger, Beta’s mind actually sharpened by a hundred times its normal focussing ability. It focussed on a singular thought; killing pottery monsters, and through this, the Exo was able to _feel_ the Light of the Traveller coursing through his whole body. It sparked and discharged off his hands and feet in arcs as his sharpened mind and body thought as one – allowing the Light to guide his action.

In a blur of motion, the Titan leapt up into the air, dragging several Thrall with him, as his body became charged by Arc energy. All the lightning that empowered him eventually went to his fists once he reached the peak of his leap, allowing him to plummet back to the ground even faster before slamming his hands into the ground, unleashing his Fist of Havoc and levelling all the Hive around him, leaving only a bunch of scattered Engrams.

Eventually, Beta recovered from his shock and his shields replenished. “Wait, what just happened?” he asked, greatly confused at the brief taste of heightened awareness.

“You…I’ll tell you later. The Seeder’s about to sink any second now, so we need to find a way to hold it in place!” Copperhead yelled, and the Titan needed no further motivation as he went straight back to lifting it with his bare hands.

“This isn’t what I meant!”

Beta was so focussed on holding the Seeder up and preventing it from sinking further that he did not notice the bright flash of light that came from within the Hive construct. Inside the malevolent device, Mira had called upon her inner strength to unleash the power of the Sunsingers: Radiance.

Her robes and skin caught fire, purging all the wounds and injuries that the Hive had dealt her in seconds. Now, she drew strength from the light of the sun itself, allowing her to cast a more powerful form of Scorch at the Knight about to cleave Gull in half, destroying it instantly. She followed it up with two Solar grenades to each Thrall that was holding Gull down while biting into his armour. The blast of Solar energy that came from each grenade not only destroyed the two Thrall attacking him, but most of the surrounding Thrall as well.

As this happened, Mira’s strength only continued to grow as she helped the Hunter back to his feet. “Get out of here, right now!” she yelled at him before pivoting on one foot to blast apart an Acolyte that was trying to sneak up on her Ghost.

It was also then that she noticed that her Ghost had finished cutting out a section of the core’s protective armour and was now dematerialising it for her own convenience.

“We have to _both_ get out of here!” Gull yelled back at her as he dematerialised his machine gun. “We’re no good to anyone dead, and we’re out of time!”

“No!” Mira looked back at the Hunter, staring at him with a look of such confidence that she could have sworn she saw his glare falter through his helmet. “Not before I Cure it.”

With one last glance at the small opening in the core, Gull nodded once before making a mad dash for the exit, making it out just as the opening began filling in with more dirt while the Seeder continued sinking.

Even the remaining Hive were beginning to take cover and protect themselves from being buried alive. Thralls and Acolytes crammed into the spaces where they spawned or remained in stasis for the duration of the journey from space, until only the Warlock remained.

The radiant Guardian, ready to end this, held her hands in the position as she would hold a rocket launcher, causing a Future War Cult-sanctioned weapon to appear. The rocket launcher in her hands bore the same colour scheme as the rest of the FWC, and was her prized possession. With the magazine fully loaded, she fired off all three rockets into the exposed core of the Seeder as she made a break for the exit, making it out as the last rocket hit the core and shattered the inner casing that protected the dark magic within it from the outside, keeping it stable.

But now that its only form of protection was destroyed, the dark magic within the Seeder reacted violently, causing a chain reaction that blew the Seeder apart from the inside.

All three Guardians were caught in the blast of the exploding Seeder, and were all thrown back a few metres across the crater as the Seeder exploded in sequence, starting from its middle section and travelling to either end of the construct until nothing was left of it except the wisps of dark energy and fragments of its hull.

Beta Tauri was the first to regain consciousness, as Copperhead kept urging him to get back up just to be sure he was still alive – or could still be brought back to life. The Titan cautiously rose to his feet, unsure of where the ground was as his internal centre of gravity took a moment to recalibrate. Something felt off to him, and he only realised what it was after hitting his head with his hand. One of his eyes had a tendency to flicker and stop working, and it seemed the explosion had taken it out for the moment. Therefore, Beta did the one thing that he knew would work to fix his eye; hit his head until it started working again.

Gull was the next to get back on his feet, using his pulse rifle to help him get a sense of balance as he got his Ghost to begin repairs on his cloak and armour. While his Ghost began rematerializing missing parts of his cloak, he began a damage assessment on the area. Naturally, the crater was even deeper now that the Seeder had exploded. Gull had underestimated the destructive force behind the weapon, and was now mentally kicking himself for it. He tried to begin the long climb out of the crater, but found that his whole body was a little too injured for that, and decided to take a seat while he let the Light of the Traveller do its work. “Ghost, remind me _never_ to take on Hive Seeder-related missions again.”

“I’ll add it to the list.”

Mira took the longest to regain the ability to stand up again, having been the closest one to the blast. As soon as feeling returned to the rest of her body below her shoulders, Mira felt the pain of more than a dozen broken bones shoot up her back from _everywhere_. Completely conscious the whole time her Light healed her body, she ached all over because of it. As far as damage assessment went, her Ghost had told her that while she had suffered several serious injuries, they were healing quite well and her armour was slowly being repaired. Unfortunately, her Radiance had simmered down to smoulders just as the force of the blast hit her, meaning that she had lost its protection when she would have liked it the most. Once the ligaments in her arm healed back together, she was able to prop herself upright – and immediately regretted doing so.

She had landed on the very edge of the new crater within the crater, and was barely hanging on by a granite rock that was firmly embedded in the ground. Her whole body had been thrown about by the force of the explosion, before gravity and the slope of the crater had caused her to roll back down its side, to finally lay across the slab of granite in an undignified manner. It didn’t take long after that for her legs to heal, and allow her to glide back up to the lip of the crater, where the Hunter was waiting.

When she reached the edge of the crater, Gull had just finished looking over his pulse rifle and stood to face her.

A few seconds passed with no words exchanged between the Guardians, until Gull finally spoke up. “Alright, Warlock. I’ll give you this one; good job.” He said as he extended his hand. “Mira, wasn’t it?”

Hesitantly, she shook his hand in return. “Mira Vuul. And…thank you for pulling me out of those tunnels before you caused the cave in.” she offered in return.

“Nah, that was a stupid move on my part.” Gull said, waving the matter off. “No need to thank me for that.”

Shortly after he said that, Beta wobbled up the side of the crater before collapsing next to the two. “We…should probably tell the Vanguard that we took care of that Seeder, huh?” Mira asked, leaving the suggestion open to anyone who wanted to take it.

“Good idea.” Gull agreed. “Ghost?” he asked, allowing his Ghost to appear and begin acting as a signal amplifier as he spoke into his communications unit. “Tower Command, this is Gunslinger Gull. I’ve…we’ve taken out the Hive Seeder in the Italian No Man’s Land. Those creeps are gonna have a much harder time establishing a foothold on Earth now.”

All three Guardians waited a few seconds before a response came through. “Excellent work, Guardians. The City owes you a debt of gratitude. Return to the Tower immediately for debriefing.” Replied Commander Zavala before communications cut off.

With a sigh of relief, Mira was the next to speak. “So, what now?”

“Well, I don’t know about you guys, but we picked up a bunch of Engrams just covering you two.” Copperhead said as he appeared and materialised a handful of Engrams on the ground. “I say we go turn them in.”

“Come on.” Gull urged as he pointed in a direction off into the distance. “There’s a Transmat station that-a way,” He said, pointing at a spot in between two hills. “Don’t worry. It’ll only be, like, a fourteen click walk.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Guardians must cross a barren, empty wasteland to reach their Transmat station and make it home. However, they may not be as alone as they think.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: I realised only after uploading the last chapter that I forgot to announce when this one was going to be released. To make sure that doesn't happen again, I'm gonna say now that the fifth chapter is going up this coming Sunday.
> 
> As another bit of trivia, I actually wrote this story with each of the Ghosts in it having different voices in mind. If you want to imagine it along with me, Mira's Ghost sounds like the regular Nolan North Ghost, Gull's Ghost has the Dinklebot voice, and Copperhead sounds kinda like Leonard Church/Burnie Burns...the Halo and Rooster Teeth fans will know who I'm talking about.
> 
> If you're wondering why, it's, well, I suppose the voices just match their personalities.

**Eight Kilometres from Transmat Station…**

The trek back to the Sparrow Transmat zone was a long one, though the Guardians thankfully did not encounter much resistance along the way. There was the occasional pair of Shank doing reconaissance or Dreg scavenging party, but it was nothing the three Guardians could not handle.

Considering what they had just been through, a fourteen kilometre walk sounded pleasant to all but Beta Tauri, who had become tired of walking after only one kilometre.

“Are we there yet?” he asked for the seventh time to no one in particular, as he adjusted the black, Dead Orbit mark that hung from his hip.

“Not unless one of us figures out how to bend space or the relative nature of time to our will.” Mira mumbled as she swiped her finger across a holographic screen her Ghost projected in front of her, which allowed her to sort through her inventory and best arrange the Engrams she had picked up along the way. "And I'm still working on the theory, so don't look at me."

"But we've been walking _forever_!" the Exo whined. "That Transmat Station has to be a million miles away!"

"We've only been walking for an hour and a half." his Ghost cut in. "Uh, he gets like this every time we're out for too long."

“In the meantime, why don’t we get to know each other a little better? Let’s start with the obvious; what are you two even doing this far out in No Man’s Land anyway?” Gull asked over his shoulder as he scurried up a ridge and took cover behind a large rock. The Hunter took a quick peek around cover before advancing forward, weapon drawn.

“Well, the Future War Cult still have some partially operational satellites in orbit around Earth. One of them detected the Seeder on its approach to Earth from Lunar, and I naturally went to scout out the area and gather-”

“Wait wait wait wait, wait.” Gull interrupted her, slinging his pulse rifle on to his back to point a finger at the Warlock. “You knew about the Seeder _before_ it landed in No Man’s Land – before the Vanguard, yet you didn’t tell anyone?”

“The Vanguard would have ordered for its destruction with no care as to study it or to understand how it functions.” Mira countered as the party of three suddenly grounded to a halt. “The data I have gathered will help save countless lives – one day. I might’ve been able to pull even more information than I already managed. That is, until you barged in guns-blazing.”

“I saved your life, the Hive are not to be trifled with.” The Hunter shot back. “A single Hive Seeder could have lost us the entire European continent to their control.”

“Oh, please. You’re being dramatic.” Mira said as she waved off the Hunter, walking past him. “In case you haven’t heard, Crota is dead. The Hive’s hold on Luna is weakening. If the calculations the Warlock Order has run are true, we should be able to take back the moon in under a decade.”

“Crota isn’t the only Hive God out there, Eris Morn-”

“Will warn us if something else is coming our way.” The Warlock finished for him, not giving Gull a chance to drag the argument any further. “Until then, any information we can gather on the Hive will be invaluable to understanding how they operate for when the Guardians next decide to take action against them.”

Mira’s Ghost appeared at her side as they continued to walk. “It seems that some groups of the Hive have fled deeper into their tunnel systems on the moon.” It said. “Others seem to be on the offensive – recklessly so.”

“Um, I don’t speak Warlock, so what does that mean?” Beta asked as he raised one hand like a schoolboy would.

“It means they’re coordinating.” Copperhead stated as he appeared at Beta’s side. “Coordinating and planning something.”

A second of silence passed as the heavy thought settled in the minds of the Guardians, and what that could entail, before Gull let out a long, drawn out breath. “I guess I better head back to the Lunar stations then – gotta see if the tunnels have changed any.”

“You’re a moon-man?” Beta asked with a hint of wonder in his tone.

“Uh…yeah? I guess so.” He said hesitantly before raising his hand to signal for the others to stop. In their trek to the Transmat station and mild conversation, they had wandered into the ruined remains of what looked to be an old mining settlement on the side of a mountain.

Old houses and rotten mining equipment littered the area, while a mineshaft in the side of the mountain had partially collapsed on itself, preventing anyone who dared to explore it from entering.

The Hunter had seen something in his vision move erratically for a split-second. He wasn’t sure what it was, only that did not appear on his radar and moved too quickly and quietly to have just been the environment.

“What is it?” Copperhead asked him in a hushed voice.

“More pottery monsters?” Beta said with a hint of fear in his voice as he drew his auto rifle.

“I’m not detecting anything on radar.” Mira said calmly as she held her scout rifle in the ready position.

A second passed, then another. Eventually, a whole of seven seconds had passed before Gull let out a sigh he did not know he was holding in until he let it out. “Maybe it was my imagination.” He couldn’t see it, but he was sure that the Warlock was scowling at him from under her mask. “Come on, the ridge is this way.” He said, trying to brush off the false alarm. As a Gunslinger, it was – quite frankly – an embarrassment to call out a false alarm, and he would rather forget about this incident as soon as possible.

They continued through the small settlement up the crags, all of them keeping an eye on their radar for anything enemies. “What did you mean when you said you needed to check the tunnels?” Mira asked him out of the blue.

“Oh, it’s a hobby. In my free time I map out the Hive networks under Luna’s surface. It’s not always fun and games, but if it helps the City take back the moon, then I guess it can’t hurt.”

“Ah,” The Warlock said as if she had uncovered a revelation. “I thought your name sounded familiar. Your 3D maps of the Hive networks are quite a favourite in the Warlock order.”

“Um, thanks, I guess.”

“So, what’s a cartographer like you doing all the way out here?” Mira’s Ghost inquired.

“Well, I was visiting the Cryptarchs in the Tower to turn in some Engrams when Cayde asked whether I’d be interested to make a little extra Glimmer finding out what happened to the Sparrow Transmat station on the edge of the Italian No Man’s Land. So, here I am.” The gunslinger explained.

As he finished his tale, the three Guardians arrived at a plateau on the mountainside that overlooked most of the surrounding land. From here, they could see the adjacent mountain, catch a faint glimpse of the crater where the Hive Seeder used to rest, and an old, pre-Golden Age tower that had collapsed onto its side in the distance. It was supposedly a famous landmark for some reason, but its name had since been forgotten.

“There it is.” Gull said, pointing down the mountainside with the barrel of his gun. Across the plateau, a section of the mountain had collapsed, creating a gradual slope that led back down to ground-level. At its base was an old group of metal buildings connected by long sheets of tarp, surrounded by metal shafts that suspended strange, swirling devices on top of them, which spun slowly with each breath of the wind.

“What is it?” Beta asked, sounding absolutely awestruck by the sight.

“It’s a wind farm, Beta.” He told the Exo, to which said Exo responded with a gasp.

“They grow wind?”

“No, why would- It uses wind turbines to make energy.” Gull explained after letting out a sigh. Already, he was getting the picture that Beta Tauri was not the sharpest knife in the drawer – as the expression went. With a chance to pay close attention to the Exo’s face, Gull found that even his appearance seemed to suggest his lack of self-care.

Antennas stuck out of either side of the Exo’s head, though the one on his left was broken off at the base. The Hunter thought this to be impossible, as the Light of the Traveller should heal all wounds. But then again, not all scars heal so easily, as he learned amongst the other Hunters. The blue light of Beta’s right eye even flickered now and then, brightening and dimming at random times.

“The City set up a Sparrow Transmat zone down there a while back. Once we get it working again, we can-” The gunslinger never got a chance to finish his sentence as something was shoved through the back of his neck while something else pierced his torso. Craning his head to look down, Gull saw a Fallen Shockblade sticking out of his gut, covered in his own blood. A second later, the blades tore through his body and caused the Hunter’s corpse to drop to the floor.

“Ambush!” Mira yelled as she drew her scout rifle to fire at the Stealth Vandals that had snuck up on them. Though she missed the first few shots, the Warlock made up for it by making the Vandals visible to all with a Solar grenade, allowing Beta to finish them off with his shotgun.

While the Titan went on his rampage, Mira crouched by Gull’s lifeless body and held her hand over it. A moment later, his Ghost materialised in her hand before disappearing, along with his body.

“Dammit!” she heard Gull yell through his Ghost. “They must have been hiding in the buildings we passed earlier.” The Hunter said as he saw through Mira’s eyes. With his physical body having been destroyed, Gull was now forced to exist through his Ghost until he could be revived by another Guardian. And, as his Ghost had been picked up by Mira, he now existed through Mira – or at least, he existed through his Ghost, which was now existing through the Warlock’s storage space.

“I’ll revive you when we reach the Transmat zone.” Mira said, ignoring what the Hunter just said as Beta finished off the last of the Stealth Vandals with hit from the stock of his shotgun.

“What? Why can’t you just revive me now?” Gull asked, sounding relatively annoyed.

As if on cue, the roar of a set of engines broke the silence as a Fallen Skiff appeared above them, firing bolts of energy as it dropped more Fallen on them.

“A Skiff? In the No Man’s Land?” Mira’s Ghost exclaimed, barely concealing his surprise. “And by the looks of that Captain, they’re from the House of Devils.” her Ghost added just as a Fallen Captain dropped out of the Skiff, followed closely by his personal Servitor.

“Dammit.” Mira cursed through gritted teeth as she began backing away with her fusion rifle drawn, quickly switching off the channel to Gull and his Ghost so that she would not be distracted. “Beta, cover our escape!”

The Titan was all too happy to oblige, as he went to town hammering every Dreg he saw with his fists while he unloaded clip after clip into any nearby Vandals. All the while, the Titan still had to watch out for his shields as the Captain’s shrapnel launcher tore through them and the Skiff’s own turrets rained down on the two remaining Guardians.

“Vandal on your left!” Mira’s Ghost warned her, which she responded to by firing off a blast of her Scorch at the oncoming Vandal before tossing a grenade forward to give her room between the Fallen and herself.

More Fallen were just about to jump out of their Skiff, when suddenly, another Skiff appeared and began firing on the Skiff that was attacking them. Soon, both Skiffs were locked in battle as Fallen took pot-shots at each other from the hatches in their respective ships.

“Huh, the House of Kings. Maybe we should let them settle this one.” Copperhead suggested to the Guardians as Mira continued to backpedal out of the impending fire-fight.

However, Beta wasn’t done just yet as he ran forward with his shotgun raised to finish off the distracted Fallen Servitor and his Captain, killing the Captain with a direct hit to his face by Stormfist. With the Captain dead, the Titan blew out a chunk of the Servitor’s front with a point-blank round from his shotgun, and only then did he begin to retreat from the ensuing fight between the Fallen houses.

At the base of the mountain, the Guardians could still here the rumble of battle between the different Fallen as they made their way over to the raised tent that shielded the Transmat device. “Boy, the Devils sure messed up coming into No Man’s Land like that.” Gull said with a chuckle as Mira summoned his Ghost forth.

“I think anyone who wanders into the No Man’s Land is just asking for trouble.” She commented as she poured some of her Light into the Ghost in her hand, causing it to flare with a bright light before fading to reveal the Hunter standing in front of her.

“Hey guys!” Beta hollered as he finished his sweep of the perimeter. “Look what I found inside that Captain.” Holding up his left hand, he showed the other two the blue Engram he picked up during his fight.

“Oh, a blue. Good for you.” Gull said, without actually giving his response much heart as he walked under the tent to do a quick once-over the Transmat device. “Ghost, see what’s wrong with this thing and try to get it working again.”

As the Hunter released his Ghost to begin repairs on the device, his attention was caught by the Warlock clearing her throat behind him. Rising to his feet, he tilted his head to the side. “What?”

Mira placed her hands on her hips as she let out a scoff. “No ‘thank you’?”

“This just makes us even for earlier.” The Hunter stated with a shrug.

“Wha-no it doesn’t. You didn’t have to revive me!” Mira snapped at him.

“No, but I still saved your life.”

“I told you, I had it under control – and I demand that you show me some respect.”

“Ugh, fine.” Gull said with a groan at last. “Thank you, you pulled me out of the fire back there.” His words sounded forced and polished, as if he said the same thing to every other Warlock that helped him before. “You want me to take you out for dinner or something?”

At that, Mira let out a hysterical scoff and snort. “Please. Even if I swung that way, I’d never go out with the likes of you.”

The response caught the Hunter off-guard, not expecting that kind of reply at all. He was about to respond when his Ghost cut him off. “Well, the damage isn’t too extensive.” It said as it floated in between all three Guardians. “We should just consider ourselves lucky that the Fallen didn’t strip it for parts, and that everything we need to repair it is right here. Still, I could use some help.”

Copperhead suddenly materialised by the Titan’s side and floated over to Gull’s Ghost. “Sure, I’ll take a crack at it.”

The Warlock’s Ghost also appeared and floated over to the other two, which then all proceeded to begin repairs on the Transmat device.

“Good, the sooner it’s repaired, the sooner we can get back.” The Hunter said with a sigh as he walked out from under the tent and sat down on a nearby box. “In the meantime,” he began fiddling with his helmet as he depressurised it and unlatched the clasps that held it in place. “-I need some fresh air.” He said as he took his helmet off. As the Transmat station was on the edge of No Man’s Land, the air here wasn’t so filled with aerosol chemicals or poisonous gases. This made the air relatively breathable, with the only side-effects being a mild scratchy feeling in the back of Gull’s throat.

The Warlock wordlessly followed his lead, removing her helmet as she leaned back on one of the nearby wind turbines. Shaking out her dark-blue hair, Mira let out a sigh as she took in a breath of the mostly-clean air. When she turned to the Hunter, she was immediately confused by Gull’s surprised expression. “What?”

“You’re…an Awoken.” He simply stated, though he didn’t mean for it to come off sounding so…short.

“Uh, yeah? You got a problem with that?” Mira snapped back at him, though she was only pretending to be upset with him. Truth be told, the Awoken found Gull’s reaction amusing.

“No, no.” The Hunter said as he calmly dismissed her sudden defensive tone with a wave. “I just don’t see a lot of you outside the Tower. Always a treat to run into an Awoken who can hold his-um, her own ground in a fight.”

This time, it was Mira was surprised by Gull’s response, though she didn’t let it show on her face. “Well…always a pleasure to meet a Gunslinger that can actually land his shots.” She jested, causing Gull to let out a light chuckle.

“Oh, are we sitting down and talking about our feelings?” Beta asked as he abruptly plopped down on a crate opposite the Hunter. “Can I go next?”

“Sure, mind also telling us what you’re doing out here in No Man’s Land?” Gull asked as he began tossing one of his knives in the air. “Like Mira said; anyone out here’s just asking for trouble.”

“Oh, I just walked in here.” The Titan said automatically, drawing the confused look of the other two Guardians.

“You…walked in?” Mira parroted, thoroughly confused as to what the Exo meant.

“Yeah, I’ve been hot on the trail of that one Archon…uh, Jaksis. I saw his Skiff fly this way and went after it.” Beta explained as he manually adjusted the antenna on the left side of his head.

“Wait, Jaksis? That one Archon for the House of Devils?” Gull asked. “Isn’t he dead?”

“He…huh?”

Mira shared a look with Gull before turning to speak to Beta. “Yeah, the Tower confirmed his death over five years ago.”

A clueless expression passed over Beta’s face for a few seconds as the light in his eyes flickered in brightness while a buzzing sound could be heard coming from his head, the literal gears beginning to turn. “Oh, yeah. They did.”

“Finally!” the Guardians jumped at how loud Copperhead shouted. “I’ve been telling him that for the past three months! He’s done nothing but chase Fallen Skiffs back and for across the EDZ for the past six weeks!”

“Ok…I have a question for you.” Mira said as she folded her arms over her chest. “Your number, 1337, have you actually been rebooted that many times?”

Pausing for a second, Beta shrug as the two pairs of eyes fell on him. “Don’t know. I’ve been through so many reboots I’m not even sure what range it’s in. All I know is,” he said as he turned around on his crate. “-last I checked, there were one-thousand three-hundred and thirty-three scratches on the back of my head.” The Exo pointed to the back of his head, where it seemed that hundreds of little scratches had been etched onto his skull in a similar fashion to the old ‘four-down one-across’ style.

“Huh, mind if I take a look?” Mira asked as she pushed off the turbine to walk over to where Beta sat. However, before she could reach him, a chirpy voice cut through the air.

“It’s done!” Copperhead said as he flew over to Beta. “Transmat repaired, we can now summon our Sparrows.”

“Great.” Mira said with an excited gleam in her eyes as she skipped over to the Transmat unit. “Ghost, I need a hand with this.” She said just as her Ghost floated out of the device.

“What are you doing?” Gull asked as his Ghost returned to his open hand. “The thing works, let’s get out Sparrows and get out of here.”

Pulling open one of the panels on the Transmat’s sides, Mira sent out her Ghost to begin re-wiring the device. “Question; where does the Sparrow come from when you summon it?” she asked him cryptically.

“Is this some kind of trick question?”

“No tricks, just answer the question.”

“The Sparrow…comes from the cargo bay of our Jumpships.” Gull stated neutrally.

“Right!” Mira exclaimed as she slammed the panel close once her Ghost was finished. “Believe it or not, Transmat works both ways; if we can summon our Sparrows to the Transmat site, then we can also send it back with the Transmat unit.”

“Where is this going?”

“I reconfigured the Transmat to transport _us_ to our Jumpships from here.” Mira stated bluntly, irritated with the Hunter’s constant questioning. Holding her Ghost over her hand, the little light began spinning rapidly as it prepared to transport her across kilometres of space in a matter of seconds.

“Are you sure that’s safe?” The Hunter asked her as the Warlock began to glow with a radiant blue light.

“It’s not the first time I jury-rigged a Transmat beacon.” She said right before dematerialising in a flicker of blue light.

Beta was the next to step up to the Transmat, holding out Copperhead as he began to glow just as the Warlock did. “Goodbye!” Beta said with a wave as he vanished.

Hesitating for a moment, Gull eventually took a breath as he stepped up to the Transmat, his white and yellow cloak fluttering in the light breeze.

“Are you sure you want to leave just yet?” his Ghost asked him as he summoned it. “If we go now, there’s no guarantee that we can just come back here.”

“Eh,” Gull exclaimed as he his Ghost started spinning above his palm, emitting a faint light. “I’ve had enough of this Italy for a while.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Guardians check in with the Tower for a quick refuel-and-reload before heading out - which ends up taking longer than any of them would have liked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: I think I just about missed the mark for this one. Sorry for those of you who were waiting on this being uploaded as soon as Sunday came around, but editing took a little longer than I would have liked. Additionally, the next chapter will be going up on Friday, so I'll make sure I get it out there early this time.
> 
> As another bit of trivia before we move on, did anyone figure that only one of the three OC Guardians is actually mine? Yeah, the other two are the characters my Fireteam members made up. Write in the comment if you can guess who it is, or if you have something nice to say about the story in general.

**The Last City Airspace…**

Internally groaning and externally sighing, Mira rubbed her temples as she contemplated the findings she recovered from the Seeder and the Hive activity in Old Italy. Despite what she told the others, most of it was stuff the FWC – and even the Consensus – already knew, while the rest of the data didn’t make any sense. It wasn’t like she lied to the Hunter – this information could go towards saving more lives and figuring out how to push back the Hive, it would just take a few months to decipher.

Yes, someone ordered the launch of the Seeder, but according to the translated orders she managed to find, the Wizard whose name was all over the transcript has been dead for at least a month – a casualty in the Guardians’ attempt to banish Crota back to his own Hive dimension.

_No, not attempt,_ she reminded herself. _The Guardian succeeded. Crota and the Hive aren’t invincible, but if that's the case I suppose nothing is impossible._

“Perhaps she placed the order _before_ she died, and made it so that it would be executed _when_ she died.” The Warlock mused to herself as she propped her feet on top of the flight controls of her cockpit. “That makes sense right?”

“We’re coming up on the Tower.” Her Ghost told her, shaking her out of her own musings as the Awoken took manual control of her jumpship and began banking towards the ship hangar.

“Right. Standby for landing.” She replied while pulling up on the controls to decelerate her approach. A platform in the docking bay rose for her ship to dock on, which magnetically locked her ship so that it wouldn’t bump into any other jumpships nearby.

Flipping a quick switch, Mira activated the ship’s Transmat and instantly teleported a metre from her ship on the dry-docks. It was a routine for her; after returning from another expedition, she would head straight to Lakshmi-2 to pass on her findings before heading out again. That was really all there was for the life of a Warlock – especially one at her level in the Future War Cult’s ranks.

Well, that and a few side-stops in between expeditions and return trips to grab a bite, visit the Warlock Order, go through routine Guardian checks and _maybe_ have something strong to drink.

This time though, the Warlock made a beeline for the Future War Cult’s corner of the Tower, passing by various Frames, Guardians and other Tower-workers that were going about their business as she causally removed her helmet to let her cobalt-coloured hair fall at her side as it dematerialised in her hands, immediately put away into her inventory by her Ghost.

“Hey, Mira!” a female voice called out for her. Turning to the source of the voice, Mira saw none other than Amanda Holliday walking towards her. “I need to talk to you about your ship.”

Smiling at the Shipwright, the Awoken waved her hand in return, never stopping her steps “Maybe later, dear. Got some business to take care of.” She said with a wink, causing the Human’s usual jovial expression to deadpan as she froze in her tracks.

Mira quickly ascended the staircase to the upper floor of the recreational area of the ship hangar, where the Future War Cult had set up shop, hunkered down and refused to move. Standing with her back to the stairway and facing out the long glass window in front of her was Lakshmi, clutching a datapad in her arms as she slowly turned around to face Mira. “Mira Vuul, how was your search?” the Exo greeted.

With a sigh, Mira brought forth her Ghost to begin transferring the data she gathered to Lakshmi’s Ghost. “Not as fruitful as I had hoped. Your intel was good, but what I recovered…most of the data we already know.”

“And the rest of it?”

“The rest I do not understand.” She confessed after a moment’s hesitation. “The Hive work in riddles and I understand them less now than I do the Vex.”

Lakshmi nodded her head in acknowledgement as she turned around to walk over to the nearby table and take a seat. “Ever since Crota fell, the Hive have been acting…differently.” Her blue eyes met Mira’s yellow ones as she chose to stand before the representative of the FWC.

“Have you spoken to Eris Morn about the Hive?” Mira inquired as she picked up an intricately carved bauble that sat on Lakshmi’s desk. “The mystic has some interesting things to say about them.”

“I have…and it seems to confirm a theory I have concocted.” The multi-coloured Exo said with a smile – or, what Mira thought looked like a smile.

“What theory?” the Awoken asked, her attention now focussed on Lakshmi when the words grabbed her attention. She leaned forward over the desk, placing the bauble back where she had found it.

Glancing between the datapad and the Guardian before her, Lakshmi let out a weary sigh as she swivelled in her chair. “More data will need to be gathered before I can give a sure answer to that question.”

Mira growled in annoyance, clearly seeing through what Lakshmi was trying to say. “I gathered as much as I could before the other Guardians showed up and destroyed the Seeder.” She reasoned, folding her arms across her chest.

“Perhaps.” Lakshmi replied, offering a smile a second later to let the Warlock know she was only jesting. “In the meantime, I would advise you keep an open mind about the Hive as you travel to Mars.”

“Mars?”

“Yes.” When the Exo placed the tablet she was holding on the table, it made an audible sound when glass hit hardwood. “My sources among the Cryptarchs and Forward Operations have brought me back evidence that suggests the Cabal are gathering their forces over the red planet.” Lakshmi leaned forward as her eyes darkened to show that she was being dead-serious. “I want you to go and find out _if_ I need to alert the Cult that we are preparing for full-scale war with those beasts. This may be a routine assembly of their units, but our scouts have expressed their worries that the Cabal may be planning to attack Earth.”

The FWC representative’s Ghost was at her side in a flash of light. “I’ve already transferred the necessary files and coordinates for you to begin your investigation, Warlock Mira.” It stated in a neutral tone.

Mira hesitated for a moment before nodding in reply, dipping her head lower than usual so that it constituted as a bow. “Thank you, Lakshmi…may the truth deliver us to war.” The Warlock recited Lakshmi’s mantra in farewell.

“And may that war deliver us to our survival. Farewell, Mira.” Lakshmi replied before Mira turned and began to leave the Future War Cult’s outpost.

“I strongly advice against working so closely with that Exo, Mira.” Her Ghost told her as it materialised at her side. “One of these days, her ‘Expeditions’ are going to get us both killed.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time.” The Warlock muttered to herself, but when she spoke to the Ghost, she instead said, “Did you get everything that her Ghost transmitted?”

Pausing for a second, the Awoken’s Ghost eventually lit up with a response. “Yes. According to these coordinates, it shouldn’t be hard to-”

“Mira get over here – right now!” Amanda Holiday hollered as she tapped her foot impatiently where she rested her back against the metal fencing that separated the dry-docks from the rest of the hangar.

With a wave, the Warlock dismissed her Ghost as she sauntered over to the blonde shipwright. “Something I can do for you, Mandy?”

Amanda’s frown deepened as she folded her arms even tighter across her chest. “Don’t you ‘Mandy’ me, and don’t think you can just bat your eyes, or wave your hand around like some space mage and expect me to drop the matter.”

Sighing to herself, Mira closed her eyes for a second thinking, _I am not getting out of this one,_ before reopening them to face the scowling woman. “Fine, what is it?” she asked, never letting her smile drop.

The shipwright quickly took the datapad that hung at her side and thrust it into the Warlock’s hands. “Mind tellin’ me what these readings are?” she asked with a bit of bite to her tone.

“Um, the wavelengths of the emissions from my jumpship?” she replied hesitantly, knowing very well that it was what Amanda had open on her tablet, but not knowing where it was going.

“Yeah, except they’re not!” the blonde Human replied after taking her tablet back from the Warlock with a violent tug. “I went over this thing twice, and found that your ship is giving off a second wavelength that intermingles with the first. You’ve got something else on that ship that’s producing this frequency and I wanna know what it is and whether it could cause your Warp Drive to have a meltdown.”

“Yeesh, don’t you think you’re being a bit dramatic, Holliday?” Mira asked, trying to deflect the question.

Glaring at the Guardian, Amanda responded while waving her wrench in the air. “My job is to make sure your ships are in working order and that they don’t explode or cause _other_ jumpships to explode with them. So no, I’m not being dramatic. And for the record, you’re supposed to log your inventory regularly with both the Vanguard and Tower Command, but from what I’ve seen the last time you did any of that was a month and a half ago.”

“Aww, Amanda. Are you still mad about that little incident with the Warp Drive?” the Awoken asked with a smirk and a glint in her amber eyes.

The blonde’s mouth hung open for a few seconds as she tried to think of a response. “This has nothing to do about that Warp Drive.”

“So you’re not mad about the Warp Drive anymore?” Mira asked, hoping that the shipwright wasn’t.

“Of course I’m still mad about the Warp Drive – the one _you_ stole!” Amanda suddenly yelled, drawing the attention of several other workers and engineers in the hangar.

“I’m just borrowing it.” The Warlock responded calmly as she tried to calm the blonde down by placing a hand on her shoulder.

“You slept with me just so you could get into my personal workshop and steal my one-of-a-kind Warp Drive! How am I _not_ supposed to be mad at you?” Amanda yelled back as she angrily batted the arm on her shoulder. Never mind the fact that she was a Guardian, if anyone messed with Amanda Holliday’s personal stash of trinkets, she wouldn’t care if they were Crota’s father – they were going to suffer at her hand.

Mira was just about to respond when a light at her side brought her attention to her Ghost. Holding her hand out, the Ghost materialised above it and flashed the shipwright a look that told her to hold off whatever she had to say next. “It’s the Vanguard. They’re requesting our presence in order to personally debrief us on what happened with the Seeder in Old Italy.”

With that, the Warlock flashed Amanda a quick grin as she dematerialised her Ghost. “Sorry, Mandy, duty calls.” As she began backpedalling, the blonde made no move to follow her. She only stood there with a glare fixed firmly on her face. “And I’ll be sure to return that Warp Drive once I’m done using it!”

“You’d better!” Amanda hollered after her. “And you can forget about your monthly free maintenance.”

As she passed through the common areas of the Tower, Mira’s Ghost appeared at her side once again. “Are you ever going to tell her that the Warp Drive malfunctioned and you had to jettison it above Venus before it imploded?” it asked her innocently.

“Hey, whatever she doesn’t know can’t hurt her.” Mira said absentmindedly as she fiddled with her Warlock’s bond. “Now, do I look presentable?”

* * *

**120 Metres away…**

The Hall of Crypto-archaeology was a mess. Engrams that dated back decades and precious tomes that could no longer be replaced were scattered all over the place. Back and forth, Cryptarchs rushed to gather what they could to be reorganised later, once the hurricane that had blown in would pass.

Standing on top of a mahogany table was Beta Tauri-1337, hurling the various Engrams he had collected over the course of his long journey at any Cryptarch he could see, knocking over various ornaments and placeholders as he went about.

Every now and then, a Cryptarch would actually throw the Engrams he threw back at him, but often, many were complacent and satisfied with taking whatever Engrams he threw at them for decryption.

“~Engram for you!~” he said in a sing-song tone as he threw another blue Engram at a nearby Cryptarch, which bounced off her head and into the arms of another. Shouts of annoyance and pain went up as he continued hurling the shiny prisms at various others. “~Engram for you!~”

“Uh, Beta? I think the Cryptarchs have had enough.” Copperhead’s words fell on deaf ears as the Titan materialised another glowing prism that he threw at an approaching Frame that was trying to stop him. The simple android tried its best to sneak up on the Guardian and remove him from the archive, but the force with which he threw the Engram had the Frame sprawling on his back – mostly undamaged.

“Ugh, he never listens.” Copperhead complained as it materialised and began picking up some of the discarded Engrams. Taking a moment to look around, the bronze-coloured Ghost eventually found a suitably composed Cryptarch and flew over to him. “Hey, uh. Look, sorry about the mess.” It said, trying to figure out how to go about apologising for Beta’s antics once more. “Take these and don’t file any complaints. They should be enough to compensate for the da-”

Copperhead suddenly stopped himself as he materialised one Engram at a time. The Ghost was detecting a direct message from the Vanguard hall for him. “Hold that thought.” Materialising all the Engrams it meant to give the Crytarch, Copperhead answered the call.

“Hey, Copperhead. It’s Cayde.” The Hunter Vanguard greeted in his usual laid-back tone.

“Oh, hey Cayde.” Copperhead turned to see the surprised expression of the Cryptarch turn into one of gratitude as he grabbed the Engrams by the handfuls and ran off down the aisles of bookshelves. “Listen, I can’t talk at the moment – Beta’s tearing up the Cryptarch’s place again.”

“Good.” The Exo sounding more elated than he had the last time he called. “I need you to bring Beta over to the Vanguard’s Hall for a debriefing on the Seeder in the No Man’s Land. I really only need you to come over, but I figured Beta’d stay out of trouble more if we kept an eye on him.”

“True, true.” Copperhead said while bobbing up and down as it turned to his Guardian, watching with discomfort as Beta did a front-flip off the mahogany table, pick up a Cryptarch and toss him into a sturdy copper statue of Rezyl Azzir. “Yeesh. Yeah, I’ll bring him here ASAP.”

“Great. Try not to break anything else on the way here.” Cayde said before cutting off his end of the line.

The Ghost thought to himself that it was already too late for that as he watched his Guardian fling valuable Engrams all around the library. “You get an Engram – you get an Engram. _Everybody_ gets an Engram!”

Copperhead took half a second to figure out what he was going to say before turning to a nearby Cryptarch that was taking cover from the rampaging Titan. “Well, it looks like it’s your lucky day.” The Ghost said before flying off to the Exo’s side. “Psst, Beta. Cayde called, he wants us in the Vanguard hall for a secret mission.” Copperhead whispered into Beta’s auditory sensor on the side of his head.

“Oh, goody!” Beta exclaimed as he tossed a green Engram over his shoulder, hitting another Cryptarch square in the forehead. “I was getting bored here.” Turning to the small group of Cryptarchs that were gathering the scattered Engrams, the Titan made two peace-signs with his hands as he made his way out of the Hall of Crypto-archaeology. “Beta Tauri, out!”

Hiding behind a large, silver globe that mapped out the various continents and countries of the Golden Age, Master Rahool peered out from around its edge to watch Beta leave before beckoning his fellow Cryptarchs to his aid. “Alright, he’s gone. Let’s get to cleaning up.” He stated before clapping his hands twice to be heard in the now-silent library.

A collection of groans and moans of protest came from the various figures wearing gold and brown robes, but it didn’t stop them from picking up scattered ornaments and throwing away broken figurines. “Another broken Golden-Age horse statue.” Rahool muttered to himself with a sigh. “One day, when that Titan outlives his usefulness, I will see to it that he is made into scrap and refined into a paperweight.” Rahool swore as he helped up a Cryptarch that had been knocked over and was likely suffering from a concussion.

“Master Rahool!” one of his pupils called out to him as they ran over with a rare Engram in hand. “Look at this, another horse-statue from the Egyptian Confederacy for the collection!” the Cryptarch said excitedly.

_Looks just like the one he broke…_ Rahool thought to himself as he dismissed the young Cryptarch. “Yes, very good. I trust you know how to decrypt it and store it in numerical order with the others?”

As the younger Cryptarch went on to talk about how excited she was to be one step closer to finishing the collection, the Awoken Cryptarch master couldn’t help but feel that it would be a long time before Beta Tauri outlived his usefulness.

* * *

**95 Metres away…**

Looking between the various mentors in the Vanguard, Gull kept his fingers folded as he absentmindedly twiddled his thumbs. His hood was drawn down as a polite gesture of respect for the occasion, letting the chilled air of the Vanguard Hall flow through his buzz-cut hair.

Before him was a 3D topographical map of the Italian No Man’s Land, focussed on the area where he had conducted his last mission, which he found was known only as ‘The Roman Slopes’. The orange-coloured light that it was made of lit the Hunter’s face from below, highlighting several scars that crossed it – earned from his past life.

“So,” he started after clearing his throat so as to not seem rude to the members of the Vanguard. “-Are we going to start this debriefing?”

He got a glance from Zavala, who was looking intently at something on a tablet in his hands. “Not yet. We are still waiting for the Warlock you were with to arrive.”

 Gull’s eyebrows furrowed for a brief moment before he understood what the Titan was talking about. “Do we really- Can’t you just get the report from her Ghost, sir?” asked the Hunter.

“What’s the matter, Gull? Not a fan of Awoken Warlocks?” Cayde-6 asked from his side, sparing him a teasing look as he began adjusting the holographic map in front of them.

“Not when they’re with the Future War Cult.” The Gunslinger muttered quietly, trying to avoid upsetting Ikora Rey, who he knew didn’t harbour his distrust of the FWC. Gull was about to make a comment about what the Sunsinger had told him in passing earlier, but held it back so as to not seem petty. It was a minor relief to him that the rest of the staff that usually worked in the Vanguard’s hall had cleared out for this meeting, as Gull was never one for crowded spaces.

From what Cayde had briefly told him before he took his place, there had been very few advances on the Hive’s part since Crota’s demise, so hearing about a fully-loaded Seeder crashing into No Man’s Land was an anomaly in Hive activity – and the Vanguard wanted to know why.

“Chin up, Gull.” The Exo said with a firm hand on his shoulder. “From what I’ve seen of her, Mira might be a little…stiff, but she delivers.”

“And as I said I would be here, here I am.” The aforementioned Warlock suddenly walked into the chamber as she spoke. “I just took a minor…detour along the way.” Her face bore no expression as she walked right up to the table and placed her hands on it, directly opposite to Ikora.

“There is nothing more important than understanding the threat we face.” Ikora began as she sent her Ghost forth. “The Vanguard should take priority over every other commitment. Hunter Gull understands this – and I hoped you would too.”

“Ikora, you will forgive me if I happen to have more friends that I want to check in with after returning from an expedition than Gunslinger Gull.” Mira stated with a blank expression.

“What did you say?” Gull asked as he glared at the Warlock, taken surprise by the sudden jab at him.

“All I’m saying is that I can’t help it if you don’t have any friends.” Mira replied, folding her arms across her chest.

“Enough! Both of you.” Zavala spoke up, stopping any further arguments.  “Now that we are all here, let us proceed with this debriefing.” His voice never lost its professional tone.

“Just a moment.” Cayde suddenly interjected. “We’re still waiting on someone.”

“Everyone we invited is here, Cayde.” Ikora stated observantly. “Mind telling us who we’re missing?”

“Someone very important, with a better memory than either of these two knuckleheads.” Ignoring the looks of annoyance both Guardians, Zavala and Ikora said nothing, waiting for the Hunter Vanguard to tell them exactly who he had invited. “Y’know…that guy. Ok, it’s Beta Tauri.” He muttered as quietly as he could manage.

Gull was so sure Zavala’s eyes were going to burst out of their sockets, less so for Ikora, when he heard the name of the Titan. “We specifically agreed to _not_ invite Beta Tauri-1337!” the Titan practically shouted as he slammed a hand on the table. “You took action without the overall agreement of our council.”

“It’s not Beta I’m interested in. It’s his Ghost – Copperhead, it’s different to the others – Ikora you know what I’m talking about.” Cayde said cautiously, trying to explain himself.

A brief pause came over the group before the Warlock Vanguard let out a sigh. “It’s true. His Ghost has a unique personality unlike many others. So far, we have found that only one in every five-hundred Ghosts share this…anomalous behaviour.” Turning to Zavala, she gave him a look that told the Titan Vanguard she was dead-serious. “It knows how to work independent of a Guardian and exhibits almost Human-like problem-solving skills.”

Gull shared a look with Mira that said they were nearly equal-parts confused as to what the Vanguards were talking about – the Warlock slightly less confused thanks to the time she spent under Ikora’s mentorship. However, their minor interaction ended when the sound of something small zipping through the air became audible, and Copperhead arrived next to Mira.

“Hey, heard you guys were talking about me.” It stated as it turned around to face the entrance to the Vanguard Hall.

“’Bout time you got here.” Cayde remarked while waving at the Ghost. “Where’s your Guardian?”

“Oh, don’t worry. He’ll be here...any second now.” The Ghost said with a tone of foreshadowing. “In three...two...one.”

The sound of something heavy being rolled across the floor became clear to the occupants of the chamber as the aforementioned Titan rolled into the room on his side, his body limp and relaxed like a ragdoll.

Mira had to move out of the way as he hit the Vanguard’s table, causing the holographic projections it made to flicker for a moment before becoming still again.

For a few seconds, Beta remained still where he was on the floor, before suddenly standing at attention in a matter of seconds, before relaxing once he realised he knew all the people in the room. “Hi, friends.” He said with a wave.

“Did we really have to invite him?” Gull whispered to Cayde from where he stood, never taking his eyes off the Exo.

“Would you prefer I only invite his Ghost and let him run about the Tower unsupervised?” the Hunter asked in response, to which the Gunslinger didn’t dare respond.

“Well.” Zavala tried to start, suddenly needing to clear his throat…for the good span of five seconds. _Boy, that is not a convincing fake-cough._ “Now that we’re all here, let’s get down to business.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Guardians give their recap of what happened in No Man's Land, but suspicions arise about someone knowing more than they let on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Oh, boy. I totally missed the deadline with this one. There was just a lot more to edit and add to it than other chapters, coupled with me not being able to organise my time very well. But it's here, and I'm quite happy with how it turned out.
> 
> Unfortunately, the next chapter is going to take a while longer, because an idea came to mind about how things could be better executed and I'm not sure how much time I'll have to work on it. Expect it in, oh, say, ten days from now?
> 
> In the meantime, it never hurts to leave a Kudos, and write down your thoughts and comments, as well as predictions for what Mira might find on Mars. Those that guess right will get a special mention on the next chapter.

With everybody ready and the various holographic projections alight, the Titan Vanguard got straight into the report on the Hive Seeder in the No Man’s Land. It started off with the three Guardians taking less than three minutes to give the abridged version of what happened in Old Italy before the Vanguard launched into a series of questions about specifics on what happened. To the Vanguard, the incident in the Roman Slopes meant something. What it meant, however, was up for debate. “Our main concern about this Seeder in the Italian No Man’s Land is that it made impact _very_ recently – unlike the ones scattered throughout Old Russia.” The bald Awoken went on. “According to Beta Tauri’s Ghost-”

“Copperhead.” Beta suddenly interrupted, correcting the Vanguard.

“According to…Copperhead _and_ Warlock Mira Vuul’s Ghost, the Hive were working even faster than normal to establish a foothold in that damned wasteland.” Said Zavala after a couple seconds hesitation.

“While the Hive have never been known to do things halfway,” Ikora continued. “-What we’re concerned about is whether or not this is the beginning of another invasion.”

“If it is, then the City needs to double its efforts at fortifications and send out more Guardians to counter the looming threat.” Zavala declared, folding his arms together.

“If it is, then this should at least set them back several months…right?” Gull asked, trying to contribute.

“Knowing those three-eyed freaks, one busted Seeder is like a Fallen Vandal losing his shock-pistol.” Cayde-6 interjected as he waved a hand over the table, causing the holographic display of a Hive Seeder to rotate faster and faster. “They probably have another one – if not on their belt, then in one of their hands.”

“So destroying it made no difference – no, that’s ok.” Gull muttered to himself before turning to look over at Mira. “Let’s go over what we learnt from them, then. Got anything to share with us, Mira?”

“As a matter of fact, I do.” Summoning her Ghost, Mira sent it forth to project a screen of light which displayed several lines of some kind of cypher the Hunter didn’t understand. “While I was down in the caverns, I came across a device which kept relaying the same set of codes – an order from a Wizard to dig deep into the Earth once the Seeder landed. As far as I can tell so far, there’s nothing that indicates this message was given to more than this Seeder-”

“But there’s nothing that says it wasn’t.” Ikora interrupted as she pulled the line of code towards her with the wave of a hand. “I’ll have to go over this with the Cryptarchs to find out if there’s a way to tell who this message was sent to. If it is the start of a Hive invasion, maybe the code can tell us what we should expect.”

“The World’s Grave has files that detail over a thousand different contingency protocols the Hive follow through with in the event of a failure, stronghold breach, the death of an Exalted Hive,” Copperhead began as he flew to the centre of the table. “-it’ll take hours to find out which one this is – if it _is_ one of the protocols at all.”

“Um, excuse me.” Beta spoke up, raising his hand. “Can you guys explain to me the secret mission, or did I already miss the briefing?”

“Sure thing.” Copperhead replied before anyone else could say anything. “We need you to stand in that corner over there.” The Ghost looked to the far right corner near the entrance to the Vanguard Hall. “You’ve got to stay there, and make sure that no pottery monsters interrupt us while the big boys – and girls – do the talking.”

Looking back and forth between the various faces around the table, the Exo kept a blank, thoughtless expression up for five seconds as one of his blue eyes flickered and went out. Looking between the various faces, Mira found that only Gull shared her hesitation and doubt that Beta would follow through with the ridiculous command, while the rest of the Vanguard maintained stern, emotionless expressions.

“Ok!” the Titan chirped before skipping over to the corner and resting his face in the crook where the walls met, remaining absolutely still.

The Vanguards let out a collective sigh of relief as the immediate danger of the Striker was now adverted, though Zavala couldn’t help but take swift glances at the Titan in the corner of the room every now and then. “Relax, Commander.” Copperhead began, floating closer to the Titan Vanguard in order to speak in a lower volume. “He’s currently in…sentry mode…kinda. He won’t move a muscle unless the Hive happens to show up, or unless I tell him to.” The Ghost was immediately proven wrong when a thudding sound could be heard as Beta began tapping his head against the wall.

“Moving back to the topic at hand, the fact that we haven’t detected any other Seeders entering Earth’s orbit probably means that we shouldn’t expect any more pods anytime soon.” Cayde said, contributing to the conversation. “Now all that’s left to discuss is what the Hive were thinking – only firing one Seeder isn’t like them.”

“They could be taking a new approach to it.” Mira speculated. “We’d know they were going for full-scale war if they launched multiple Seeders, but one Seeder was a small enough projectile to slip by our satellites. Perhaps they only fired one to try and hide under our radar…as they slowly built up a force under the Earth’s crust.”

“Built up a force for what?” Zavala thought out loud. “What are they planning?” the Titan Commander then went on to mutter to himself, lost in whatever was on his tablet as he turned away from the different members of the conversation.

No one had the answer to that question – not yet at least. Instead, the Hunter in the room coughed into his hand in order to get the attention of the various members of the Vanguard. “With, um, all due respect, sirs, this sounds more like your field of expertise – not mine. So, if we’re done here, I’d like your permission to be dismissed.”

“Why the rush, Gull?” Cayde asked, leaning on the table. “Got something you want to hide?” the Exo’s tone wasn’t accusing, but the way he phrased it made the question give the Gunslinger mixed signals.

“No.” Gull replied instantly. “I just don’t think we’ll get much else done standing here mulling over the Hive until we know more about them. Not to mention we were summoned here to give a debriefing on the No Man’s Land incident, which we did, so if there’s nothing else I’d like to be on my way.”

Cayde’s blue eyes scanned Gull’s for any trace of deception, but even Zavala could tell Gull merely had the Hunter mentality of finding it uncomfortable to be in one place for so long. The Gunslinger was also punctual in his arrival, so the Titan Vanguard had a feeling it was to get this over with as soon as possible. “Sure thing,” the blue Exo responded with a smile as he put an arm to Gull’s shoulder. “-I just wanted to discuss something with you _real_ quick.”

The two Hunters made their way to the window of the Vanguard Hall as the meeting continued, primarily between the two Warlocks and the Ghosts.

“I’d like to know if you saw anything down there that seemed out of the ordinary, Mira.” Ikora pressed on, despite the Awoken’s constant reassurance that it looked just like any other Hive crater on Earth.

“I told you; everything I saw my – Ghost saw, nothing stood out or made it seem like this was any different to the others.” Mira reassured once more, placing her hands firmly on the table in front of her.

“Perhaps,” the Warlock Vanguard mused as she took another glance at her notes before locking her gaze on Mira. “-I just wanted to be sure. Sometimes, it takes the eyes of a Guardian to see something that a Ghost can’t.”

“Right,” Mira breathed out with a sigh. “Do you get the feeling that this could be the start of something more? Something that might threaten the City?” she asked while calling her Ghost back to her. “I’ve been having trouble making sense of the Hive’s strategy over the past two weeks.”

The dark-skinned Human moved to put a hand to the Sunsinger’s forearm before speaking. “The Hive have lost a powerful leader, their hierarchy is still undergoing restructure. You are welcome to the Warlock archives on recent information of the Hive, but keep that in mind when you next encounter them.” With that, Ikora turned away from her to get back to her research. “You’re dismissed.”

Mira maintained a pout for a good two seconds before it disappeared when she turned to leave _._

* * *

Meanwhile, Gull had taken his place beside the Hunter Vanguard, both staring out the window that overlook a small portion of The City, the wall that surrounded it and beyond. “What’s this about, Cayde? Something I said?” Gull asked quietly, momentarily afraid that he had unknowingly insulted someone or said something he shouldn’t have.

“What? No man, relax.” The Exo’s voice went comically high for a moment before it returned to its normal tone. “Look, I just wanted to talk to you about how we’ve recently begun operations to take back the Ocean of Storms, starting with that particle accelerator near the Forward station.”

“Ok.” Gull began quietly, turning to face Cayde with his arms crossed over his chest. “What about it? I’m not…banned from helping out, am I?” the Hunter’s tone was cautious, treading lightly to make sure he didn’t upset the Vanguard.

“It’s the opposite, actually.” Cayde went on. “You have some of the best experience with navigating and using the Lunar terrain to your advantage. But…ever since Eris came back, Zavala and Ikora have been concerned with what we might find the deeper we go into the Hellmouth.”

Gull’s arms dropped to his side as his expression turned into a frown. “Are you saying I can’t go down there and do map-work anymore?”

“Again, quite the opposite.” Cayde repeated with a chuckle. “We’re going to need to know our way around down there, and you’re one of the few Guardians willing to brave it. But…now that we’ve got a general idea of how messy it is down there, the others wanted me to try and convince you to join a Fireteam next time you go back down there.”

_Ah, so this is what it’s about._ The Gunslinger thought with a groan, turning away from the Vanguard. “Cayde-”

“You know how many Guardians we lost trying to take back the moon, we’re not going to let more just die on account of being careless.” The Exo shot back as Gull pivoted on his heel to face the other Hunter. “Look, you don’t even have to join an existing Fireteam. You can go hand-pick your own teammates if it bothers you that much.”

“I don’t work well with others, Cayde.” Gull stated firmly. “I’m more efficient working alone.”

“Not again with this lone-wolf thing, remember what happened last time?” Cayde shot back, causing Gull’s features to twitch at the memory. “The two-Guardian policy was designed to make sure we don’t have repeats of that incident, or others like it. Look,” the Hunter Vanguard put a hand on Gull’s shoulder to make sure he had his attention and that the Gunslinger wasn’t just blocking out his words. “-I know what taking back the moon means to you, but it’ll mean even less if you just die one day because a Cursed Thrall got the better of you.”

“I don’t like other Guardians.” Gull stated with a square look, saying nothing more for a moment before letting out a sigh. “But if the Vanguard thinks so, then…I’ll _consider_ asking around next time I’m doing catrography.”

With a small chuckle, Cayde pulled up his tablet and began swiping through the various programs and files on it. “Hey, that’s all I’m asking. Though if Zavala catches word that you’ve been in the unexplored regions _without_ backup, he might actually ban you from Luna.”

“Pfft, he can’t do that.” The Hunter dismissed with the wave of a hand before thinking about what Cayde just said before turning to look at the Exo with his eyebrows furrowed in concern. “Can he?”

“I don’t know, haven’t had to ban any Guardians so far and Andal neglected to tell me if I have VETO rights or something like that.” Glancing back over to the long table where the Vanguard worked, Cayde’s eyes swivelled back to Gull before he spoke in a whisper. “There’s something else.” He pulled the Gunslinger off to a corner in the Vanguard Hall before speaking to him in a hushed tone. “I need you to do something else for me – then I’ll let you get back to your moon-mapping.” The expression on the Exo’s face told Gull he was being serious.

“Alright.” Following Cayde’s lead, Gull took a quick glance at the other occupants in the room before speaking. “What is it?”

The Vanguard leaned in even closer so that he could whisper directly into Gull’s ear. “Something’s bugging me and Ikora about What’s-Her-Face.” As he said this, Cayde took a quick glance at the Warlock Vanguard, who was busily going over her findings on a tablet.

“Who, Mira?” Gull asked while Cayde nodded in affirmation.

“We think she and the FWC know more about what’s going on off-world than their telling us.”

“Probably, especially since the FWC apparently picked up the Seeder before it crashed.” Gull added, causing Cayde’s eyes to go wide with surprise.

“What?! How do you know this?”

“Because she told me.” Gull explained, whispering to make sure he wasn’t overheard. “When we were leaving No Man’s Land, Mira told me that she went there because FWC satellites picked up the Seeder on approach to Earth, so she went to the area and made it to the Seeder as soon as it crashed.”

“Why are you only telling me this now?” the Exo gave him a sceptical look. “Zavala and Ikora would've had her head then and there for withholding information.”

“I was waiting to see if she would say anything.” Gull paused to breathe and let out a sigh before turning his attention back to Cayde. “What are you going to do with that…what I just told you?”

The Hunter Vanguard hummed in thought for a moment before turning his attention back to Gull. “For the moment, nothing, but I want you to tail her for a while and see if she gets up to anything that we can bring to the Consensus.” At the annoyed look Gull gave him, Cayde continued. “Just for 24 hours, Gull. That’s all I’m asking. If you don’t find anything, you can go back to Luna and I’ll even send you a list of available Guardians that’ll work well with you.”

“And if I do, you want me to report back to you.” Gull finished, bobbing his head in acknowledgement. “What should I even be looking out for?”

“Well, knowing the Future War Cult, you’ll know it when you see it.” Cayde said as he summoned his Ghost. Holding out his free hand, the Ghost materialised a paper-thin piece of metal, engraved seamlessly with several zigzagging lines. “Take it – a little something special from yours’ truly.”

Staring at the strange card for a moment, Gull eventually took it, careful not to break, bend or cause it any damage. “What is it? A cheque for Glimmer?” he asked after shoving it in the pocket of his outfit.

“Yeah, just give it to Xander and he’ll give you the payment up-front. Think of it as an advance for your help, since - y'know, it's not an official Vanguard request.” Winking one eye, Cayde turned to walk back to the table. “I’ll see you when you get back.”

* * *

Back along the war table, Commander Zavala was concluding the reports that the Ghost shared with one another. “The tactical thing to do would be to send more Guardians into the Hellmouth and disable any Hive Seeders they come across _before_ they can be launched.” Copperhead stated.

“I understand this, but we cannot afford to waste more Guardians when the City itself is not completely secured.” Zavala replied, going over the tactics in his head while Copperhead pushed on with his argument.

“How many Guardians did it take to destroy the heart of the Black Garden?” it asked, surprising Zavala as he did not expect to be questioned by a Ghost.

“That’s not-”

“How many, Zavala?”

The Titan Vanguard stared back at the single red orb that seemed to glare at him for a few seconds before sighing. “Three.”

The intensity of its gaze eased up at the answer. “I don’t think it’s unreasonable to propose that we send a couple Fireteams to Luna for an ‘Asset Denial’ run. That’s what we still call it, right?”

For a long moment, Copperhead’s suggestion was met by a long, stoic silence from the Commander, but it was eventually broken when the Titan let out a sigh of acceptance. “I’ll think about it. Thank you for your help, Ghost, you are dismissed. And please, take your Guardian with y-” the Awoken had turned to look in Beta’s direction as he spoke, but froze when he saw the destruction around him.

Every monitor and database around the Titan – who still had his head against the wall and faced the corner – was cracked and sputtered sparks, while one was in flames as a pair of Humans rushed to put it out.

“Huh.” The bronze-Ghost exclaimed. “Wonder how we missed that.”

“I thought you said he wouldn’t move a muscle!” Zavala hissed, directing the accusation at Copperhead.

“I thought he wouldn’t! Unless…oh, now I see.” The Ghosts multiple points spun about as he seemed to bob up and down with his revelation.

“What?!”

“It’s his Arc energy. He channelled it every time he hits his head against the wall. The charge must’ve passed through the wall and caused the monitors to short-circuit.” Copperhead explained.

Zavala stared first at the Ghost, then it’s Guardian. His gaze flickered back and forth between the two until he finally directed a question to the Ghost. “Can a Titan channel their Arc lightning through their head?”

“I’m not sure. That was just my best guess.” Copperhead then did his best at a shrug. “Maybe Beta really is just a force of destruction.”

Zavala’s glare only grew in intensity as a deep, enraged growl could be heard from deep within his throat. “I think it’s best to leave him be.” Zavala’s Ghost spoke up, nudging Copperhead slightly to indicate that he should leave.

With a sigh, Copperhead began to float away before speaking with its back to the Titan Commander. “Are you sure I can’t just…ditch him and go find another Guardian?” the bronze prism slowly turned so that it stared at Zavala with its peripheral vision. “Wouldn’t be the first time I had to find a new Guardian.” Its voice dropped into a low, sullen mutter when it said this.

The Vanguard held his breath for a moment before he let out a long, drawn out sigh of frustration. “Unfortunately, no. Who knows when you’ll find another Guardian – or even _if_ you’ll find another Guardian; we need to work with what we’ve got. Plus, looking past all of Beta Tauri’s…faults, he still has one of the highest confirmed kill counts today.” Zavala said in all seriousness, a hint of pride escaping through his tone of voice. “Among the top fifty.” This he muttered to himself quietly before dismissing the Ghost before him.

Flying to the entrance to the Vanguard Hall, Copperhead didn’t stop when he called out to Beta. “Nice work, champ. Come on, let’s go kill some Dregs.”

The Exo pulled his head out of the small crater in the corner of the wall he had created from his constant head-bashing, looking to the Ghost before running after it. “Wait for me!”

* * *

**25 metres away…**

While waiting for Master Rahool to decode the rest of the Engrams he had collected, Gull watched from under his hood as Mira went about some business by the bounty board, conversing with Xander briefly before walking off to the Gunsmith.

“Quite a valuable find, Hunter.” Master Rahools absent banter brought Gull out of his moment of focus as the Cryptarch handed him a new machine gun. “A little worse for wear, but it seems to be an updated model from the last one you brought me.”

“Thank you, Rahool.” The Gunslinger said with a slight bow of the head as he pulled out his Ghost. “Ghost, scrap the old machine gun for parts and add the new one to my loadout.”

“Right away.” The Ghost responded in acknowledgement as Gull handed the Awoken in robes another uncommon Engram. While Master Rahool went about decrypting this one, Gull’s eyes drifted back to Mira, who had seemed to disappear. Quickly scanning his eyes about the plaza in the Tower, the Hunter almost jumped backwards at the sudden proximity of a certain Striker behind him.

“Hello!” he greeted with the wave of a hand. Taking a moment to compose himself, Gull let out a sigh before speaking.

“What is it, Beta? Can’t you see I’m in the middle of something.” As he said this, the Hunter turned to face the Cryptarch he was standing in front of, only to find that Master Rahool had taken a few steps back and slowly slid behind the flaps of his tent. The Cryptarch’s actions unnerved Gull for reasons he could not explain as he suppressed a shiver while turning his attention back to Beta.

“Oh, I just wanted to ask you, are we friends?” the Exo asked innocently as Gull’s eyebrows knotted together. “We are friends, right?”

Initially, Gull was going to deflect the Titan’s question as he looked around for Mira, however every time he did, Beta would stand in his way. Seeing no way out of his, Gull didn’t think to consider the consequences of his answer. “Yeah, sure. We’re friends, Beta.” He answered in a rush, eager to find the Warlock again. “Now, could you stand to the side a little?”

The Titan did as he was told, and Gull was able to let out a sigh of relief as he caught a glimpse of blue, yellow and red robes go around the corner to the hangar. He almost jumped backwards at the sudden sound that assaulted his ears however, as a crackling explosion suddenly came from above. Looking upwards, Gull caught the last glimpse of a dazzling explosion of Arc energy as Beta let out a cheer, having clearly thrown an Arc grenade. “I made a friend!” he cheered as Copperhead suddenly appeared at the Hunter’s side.

“You’re probably going to regret this in about a week.” The Ghost stated before disappearing without another word.

“Hey, Beta! You know the rules; no explosives in the Tower!” a Titan yelled as he passed by.

“Sorry!” the Striker called back as Gull approached the tent flaps of Master Rahools stall.

“Something’s wrong with him, right?” the Hunter whispered into the tent as Rahool poked his head out and Beta began running laps around the postmasters stall.

The bald Awoken shrugged in response. “I’m not sure. I’ve spoken to most experts in the field of Exo physiology, but have yet to come up with a diagnosis on his behaviour.”

“You know what, Rahool? Keep the green Engrams and transfer the balance of Glimmer to my account.” Gull said as he fidgeted uncomfortably on the spot, itching to run after the Warlock before she got too far. “In fact, no need for Glimmer, just pass them to Banshee and he’ll give me any valuable parts he may find.”

“What if it’s an artefact?” Rahool asked, completely unaware of the Hunter’s irritation to pursue the Awoken Warlock.

“Then…keep it. Keep it all!” Gull exclaimed as he materialised all the Engrams he had collected and passed them to Rahool in a hurry as he took off at a fast walk without looking behind him to see the Cryptarch’s bemused expression.

* * *

**22 metres away…**

“Are all the pre-flight checks done yet?” Mira asked as she ran her hand along the length of her jumpship. The Warlock’s ship was a brass-coloured Phaeton-class escort ship, more advanced in every aspect to the average Phaeton jumpship. Though it had no official name, a phrase in old Latin had been cut into the ship’s dorsal wing when she found it, which Lakshmi said was likely done by a member of Dead Orbit. The phrase roughly translated to ‘Laughing Behind Your Back’ and had no significant meaning to anyone in the Warlock Order. The name simply stuck, and that is what Mira took to calling it.

“Almost, but you can begin warming up the engines now if you want.” Her Ghost replied while transporting her into the cockpit of her ship in a flash.

With her hands on the arm-rests of the chair, the Warlock gently wiggled in her seat to find a comfortable spot. Fastening herself into the chair, Mira reached out to her flight controls with one hand while she used the other to activate the ship’s direct link to the Tower’s Air-Traffic Control. “City Air-Traffic, this is Sunsinger Mira Vuul, requesting permission to take-off.”

She waited a few seconds while pressing several lights to power up her ship before a response came through. “Sunsinger Mira Vuul, this is Air-Traffic Control, you have permission to launch – standby as we get your jumpship into launch-position.”

Mira took the brief moment to relax in the pilot’s seat as she felt her jumpship jostle about as it was moved from the storage dock to the hangar bay. Roughly five seconds passed before sunlight filtered in through her front-view window and her HUD lit up with the tactical data and alignments for a proper take-off, triangulating the proper angle for a smooth jump to orbit.

“Initiating jump in five, four, three, two, one.” She counted down to herself before pushing forward on the lever to fire up the launch thrusters and take her out of the hangar. "Ghost, set a course for Mars and prepare to jump as soon as we break the atmosphere." The panels in the cockpit lit up and began plotting a course for the neighbouring planet as her Ghost silently complied with her orders. After that, the process of jumping into orbit at this point was partially automated and partially instinctual for the Warlock.

So instinctual, in fact, that she could perform the process of launching into orbit with her eyes closed, completely unaware of the advanced, Kestrel-class interceptor that had launched out of the hangar fifteen seconds after her and was trailing several kilometres behind.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now tasked with shadowing Mira, Gull follows the Warlock's ship out to the outer reaches of Mars' orbit, where the two Guardians find something that neither could have expected.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hey, look at that. I wasn't too far off from my estimate on the next upload. Nice!
> 
> Anyways, this chapter is a little longer than the others before it, but I didn't want to split it (even though it would've worked great to keep the uploads flowing).
> 
> The next chapter will probably take just as long, if not longer, to get out. But have no fear, because I am a relentless writing machine.  
> ...  
> Now excuse me while I go procrastinate. Enjoy the chapter! Kudos if you enjoy it and subscribe so you don't miss when the next chapters come out.

**Warp-space en-route to Mars…**

Gull’s hand rested gently on the lever that controlled the warp-drive, ready to pull back on a moment’s notice. With the warp at full-speed, everything before him was a blur of blue streaks and colours. “Prepare to drop out of warp in three, two, one!” his Ghost counted down before he pulled the handle all the way back, dropping a couple million kilometres out from Mars’ orbit.

With the idea to stalk behind the Warlock’s jumpship, the Hunter had asked for his Ghost to drop him out of warp just far enough away that they wouldn’t be detected immediately by the other Guardian, but also so that they wouldn’t be too far off from Mars itself.

Gull had even taken the extra precaution to drop out of warp along an uncharted route to ensure he wouldn’t be detected by Mira.

However, the route he had taken presented several…obstacles.

“Debris, right in front of us!” the Ghost yelled as the Kestrel-class jumpship sped towards a giant sheet of metal. Abandoning the idea of stealth, the Gunslinger pulled back on the thrusters and pulled up on the flight controls. The flight thrusters burst to life as the spacecraft just barely made it over the piece of floating metal, scratching the belly of the ship as Gull banked left in order to avoid a second mass of debris.

“Where’d all this wreckage come from?!” Gull asked as he twisted the ship left and right, manoeuvring to avoid any chunk of metal big enough to do damage to the ship.

“Some of this looks like the colony ships that were trying to escape Earth during the Collapse.” His Ghost explained. “A few look like remains of that ‘Reef War’ we heard about – knocked out of orbit from the Reef and now just drifting, maybe caught in Mars’ outer gravitational field.”

Twisting the jumpship into a barrel roll, Gull barely dodged out of the way of an asteroid. “And the asteroids?”

“The Awoken used the Belt as projectiles during the Reef War. It wouldn’t surprise me to believe that a few missed their mark and drifted out towards Mars instead. Incoming shrapnel cluster coming in at 56° degrees – make necessary countermeasures by 323° degrees.” The Ghost ordered as the Hunter turned the ship about, levelling it horizontal to the shrapnel cluster to reduce the surface area exposed to the oncoming shards of metal as the jumpship didn’t create enough backwards thrust to turn the other way.

Once the sound of small pieces of metal hitting the hull stopped, Gull was able to let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding in as he stabilised the ship. “Ghost, can you still pinpoint Mira Vuul’s jumpship?”

His Ghost was silent for a few seconds before the head-up-display lit up with a series of lights that provided a path for Gull to follow. “Yes, she dropped out of warp several thousand kilometres from Mars shortly before us. However, her ship has slowed down and does not look like it is attempting to enter Mars’ atmosphere.” Gull touched a blinking light to activate the ship’s ion thrusters and carefully take him through the debris field. “Her craft is most likely attempting to orbit Mars and perform a scan of the planet’s surface.”

Gull’s jumpship entered a large, open space between the remains of a colony ship and what looked like a shredded Fallen Ketch, taking a shortcut to get to his target location.

“What’s she looking for?” Gull muttered to himself as he passed into an open area, giving him a clear view of Mars, getting larger every second as he piloted the ship for it. A second passed in silence before a blinking green circle appeared on the view-screen.

“We have a lock on the Warlock’s jumpship. Her flight-path seems to indicate that she’s heading towards the second moon of Mars, Deimos.” The Ghost explained as the green circle disappeared after passing through a hole in a destroyed ketch.

“Doesn’t look like she’s seen us yet.” Gull pointed out as he waited for a Fallen Walker-sized hunk of slag to float by and out of his way.

“Even so, let’s not get too close.” Without needing further prompting from his Ghost, Gull activated the primary engines and sped towards the Ketch that Mira had flown through.

“Ship’s scanners aren’t detecting any other ship signatures in the immediate area.” Gull said to himself, reading off the ship’s on-board computer as he turned his head to look out the view-screen. On his right, the remains of a frigate marked with the Clovis Bray logo turned on its own axis. “Everything here’s dead.”

He banked the ship right and into a barrel roll as it passed through the opening that Mira went through. With how small the Kestrel-class interceptor was compared to the Warlock’s Phaeton-class ship, passing through the opening was a lot easier for the Hunter.

After clearing the hole, Gull powered down on the engine to allow for more manoeuvrability in the tight confines of the huge gash in the Ketch, exiting out a hole on the opposite side of the wreck.

Finally clear of the wreckage and back out in the dead of space, Gull quickly tried to locate the Warlock’s ship, aware of how easily something can get lost in the vastness of the cold, black void. However, after running for five seconds, his ship’s scanners couldn’t find anything.

 _She just…disappeared?_   Gull was left confused for all of three seconds before his ship's motion detector went off.

“Movement at our aft.” His Ghost warned as the Hunter realised he had been flanked – by a Warlock of all people. “And now they’re hailing us.”

With a sigh, the Hunter pressed the button to accept the hail. Mira’s voice came clearly over the intercom. “You’ve been following me ever since I dropped out of warp. Who are you?”

“I’m sorry, I thought you’d be happier to see me.” Gull replied. There was a long pause before Mira responded.

“What are you doing here, Hunter?” the Warlock immediately questioned. “Why are you following me?”

“Straight to the point, huh?” Gull mused, getting no response. “Alright then, what are _you_ doing here?”

“Patrolling Mars, collecting information for the Vanguard, Guardian business – all things I am entitled to without someone supervising me. Let alone a Hunter.” The Sunsinger shot back.

“Tell me, Warlock; is it patrolling if you’re looking for something?” the Hunter was taking a gamble at accusing Mira of something she may or may not be doing. It could either give him a bad name, or it would give him results.

For a few seconds, the two ships flew in silence, the radio frequency dead and quiet. Gull was momentarily tempted to turn the ship around and check if Mira was still behind him, but his answer came over the communicator. “We’re all looking for something – somewhere.”

“Yeah, but not all of us are looking for something the FWC want.”

“You don’t know _anything_ about what the Future War Cult wants, or its plans for our survival.” Mira shot back, her tone carrying a hostile tone to it. “Though I wouldn’t expect any less from a Monarchist.”

“How did you…” the Gunslinger paused for a second before recomposing himself. “What gave it away?”

“Uh, you have their symbol branded on your chest-piece – it’s pretty obvious.” Looking down to where the symbol was, Gull suddenly felt stupid for asking.

“Look, I know the FWC sent you out here to look for something.” The Hunter tried to cover up his mistake by going on the offensive. “The Vanguard sent me to find out what it is and why you’ve been keeping secrets from them. Colour me curious, but all this stalking has got me interested, so if you insist on going to Mars on your clandestine mission, and since it’s unlikely you’ll just forget I was here, I might as well help you find whatever it is you’re looking for. Unless you rather I just take your confession straight to Zavala?”

Again, the communicator went silent. Gull knew better than to do anything until the Warlock responded, and sure enough, the Sunsinger’s ship appeared at his port. “There’s a rumour circulating that the Cabal have been up to something, _big_. The War Cult wanted me to assess whether it looks like they’re preparing for a war with the City.” From out of the view-screen, Gull could see the Warlock looking at him. “Gull, I don’t know what I’m looking for, only that I’ll find it.”

After a moment of silence, the Gunslinger was about to say something back, but his Ghost cut him off. “Guardians, did you see that?”

Gull’s eyes snapped to attention, looking out into the vastness of space for any sign of what the Ghost might have seen. “What am I looking for?”

“A pair of Cabal Harvesters – port side of Deimos!” the Ghost replied excitedly as the Hunter began zooming his view-screen in to catch a glimpse of the two clunky interceptors pass behind the oval-shaped moon. “It might just be a Cabal patrol, but we won’t know unless-”

“I’m moving to intercept!” Gull said before throttling the primary engines and speeding off towards where he saw the two Harvesters. Mira was right on his tail, eventually overtaking him thanks to the larger set of engines on her jumpship. “…I’m still going to the Vanguard after this.” Gull stated after a moment to break the silence.

“Go ahead; the worst they’ll do is give the War Cult a stern word. We can’t afford to be divided while we have a chance to regroup.” Mira responded.

“You’re one to talk.” He muttered into the communicator before elaborating. “Holding back secrets that could be essential to our survival is what causes distrust, Mira. I thought a Warlock of all people would understand that.”

“Only a Warlock could understand what it means to keep a secret.” The Warlock shot back as her ship flew over Gull’s and levelled out on his port-side.

“What’d you think we’ll find?” Gull asked as he directed his ship to follow in the wake of the Phaeton-class fighter.

“Eh, could be anything between a Cabal patrol fleet to a battle station.” Mira replied in a neutral, calm tone as they began making their way around Deimos.

“You say that like it’s not a big deal.”

“By Cabal standards, a battle station orbiting Mars would be their equivalent of planting a flag.”

“…Fair point.” Gull replied before his ship’s radar began flaring. “Head’s up, I’m picking up a large cluster of signals right around the bend here. Maybe we should-”

“Harvesters! Seven o’clock!” Mira yelled into the intercom as her ship broke formation, dodging out of the way of several proton missiles aimed at her ship’s underbelly.

The Gunslinger immediately followed suite, taking evasive action as he tried to locate where the shots had come from. “Son of a…where’d they come from?”

“Looks like they were in low orbit around Deimos.” The Sunsinger replied, arcing her jumpship on a parallel course to the one Gull was taking so that they passed each other halfway, a few more missiles barely missing them. By this point, Gull’s targeting computer had picked up where the Harvesters were coming from and moved to intercept.

“I’m going to run interference – see if you can take them out.” Counting the signatures that he was picking up, it looked like there were only four Cabal ships headed their way – each packed with more than enough firepower to destroy their ship five times over.

The Hunter returned fire, gunning at them with the plasma cannons attached to the base of his jumpship. The shots went wide and missed the Harvesters, clearly out of their effective range as the Cabal returned fire.

Thanks to the size of Gull’s interceptor, he was a difficult target to hit with the added manoeuvring he was able to pull off. Even though he came close several times, the Kestrel-class ship was always able to roll out of the way each time as Mira made a wide arc around their adversaries, opening up on them with a spray of plasma when she got in range.

Her bursts of fire were able to catch two Harvesters in the side, destroying one completely while disabling the other beyond operability. The remaining two began trying to move out of the way while returning fire, leaving one open for Gull to blast apart. The Warlock’s Phaeton-class ship packed greater firepower when compared to Gull’s, but what the ‘Laughing Behind Your Back’ had in firepower, the Hunter’s ‘Rope to Heaven’ made up for in firing speed, tearing through the Harvester’s thick hull with a barrage of plasma.

The remaining Harvester suddenly began to make a run for it, gunning its afterburners to full strength as it sped away from the two Guardian’s circling it.

“We’ve got it on the run, don’t lose it!” Mira barked over the communicator as Gull lined a shot straight at the Harvester’s engines. However, his finger paused over the trigger as a thought came to mind.

“Something’s off, Warlock. The Cabal _never_ retreat from a fight – they always fight ‘till their last man…uh, space-turtle…thing, drops.” Gull warned as he considered pulling back.

“You think I don’t know that?” Mira asked back rhetorically as her jumpship overtook Gull. “We’ve got to destroy it before they can call for…” as they rounded the horizon of Deimos, what they saw on the moon’s dark side caused Gull to trigger a full-stop for his ship’s engines. “…help.”

Before them, lined up in neat rows were thousands of Cabal Harvesters, flanked on either side by Cabal cruisers and warships. However, what was really impressive was the flagship at the heart of the fleet. A Cabal Carrier, larger than any Cabal vessel that either Guardian had seen before and capable of carrying a troop-force able to overrun the Last City – even without the arsenal the ship carried.

Suddenly, the first few rows of the Cabal Harvester fleet began breaking formation as they sped towards the two jumpships that had attacked their comrade.

“Ghost, get us out of here!” Gull ordered as he fired up the engines and turned around, ready to flee. “Fire up the warp engines!”

 A few seconds passed by as Gull waited with heavy breaths, choking every time a rocket struck the barrier around his ship. “What’s wrong? Why aren’t we jumping?!”

“Because we can’t.” Mira said in foreboding tone as her jumpship pulled up next to Gull’s. “I’m detecting some kind of quantum well that’s preventing us from warping – believe me, I tried too.”

With a grunt of frustration, the Hunter jostled on the flight controls to perform several evasive rolls in order to dodge a few rockets that soared past him. “Where are you detecting this ‘quantum well’ from – where’s the source?”

“…Uh.” the Warlock’s hesitation over the communicator made him more worried than he already was. Turning around, Gull fired a salvo of plasma torpedoes at anything within targeting range before going back to retreating.

“Mira, where?” Gull pressed on, sure now that he would not like whatever she said.

“…It’s coming from the Carrier.” The Sunsinger stated after a moment’s hesitation.

With a sigh of resignation, Gull pulled up hard on the flight controls to just barely avoid crashing into a Cabal Harvester. “Sorry Mira, there was some signal interference there – could you say that again?” with a bitter laugh, he opened up on a Cabal Scout Frigate with a bombing-run of blue-hot plasma. “It almost sounded like you said the well’s coming from the Carrier.”

“Gull, it is.” Mira confirmed, making the Gunslinger slam a clenched fist on his console. He cursed several times under his breath; at himself, at the Cabal, and at the pilot of the Harvester in front of him that was evading the blue streaks of plasma he fired. Eventually, after re-aligning the direction the jumpship was travelling in, the plasma bolts cut through the Cabal attack ship’s engines, leaving it stranded in space as the Kestrel-class interceptor flew over it.

“What’s the plan then, Sunsinger?” Gull asked as he deployed an irregularly-shaped orb from a compartment in his ship between the plasma cannons. As soon as it was deployed, the orb broke apart into six nodes and a central node that created a static web, causing all the Cabal Harvesters that flew through it to overload and lose power. “I don’t suppose you’re actually planning on attacking the Cabal Carrier dead-on?”

“Two Guardians in modified jumpships against a Cabal invasion fleet?” Mira let out a bitter laugh as the two ships pulled into more complex evasive formations to avoid the oncoming fire. “We won’t last a minute. Our only chance is to either call for backup or get a warning back to the City and neither of us have powerful enough transmitters to reach Earth.”

"Can we, I don't know, bounce the signal off a Comm. buoy or something?"

"We can, but we're out of range of the nearest one - and at the rate we're going we'll be vapourised before we get to it."

Gull opened his mouth to respond but stopped as several bright lights by his side filled his peripheral vision. Turning to look out the starboard side of his cockpit, the Hunter’s eyes widened at the sight of the dozen or so disruptor flares that Mira’s jumpship shot out its sides. They spread out like the wings of phoenix as the light they emitted caused any missiles the Cabal fired their way to veer off course and detonate at random. “I gotta get me some of those.” He muttered to himself before reopening the communication line. “They might not be powerful enough to reach Earth, but they _can_ reach Mars.”

“Where is this going?”

“We can’t be the only Guardians around Mars. If we broadcast a signal on an open channel, chances are someone will pick up and…maybe they’ll come and help.”

This time, the Warlock gave a hollow chuckle before replying. “No offense to your plan, but I doubt one or two extra Guardians would make a difference to our odds against the bloody Cabal fleet!”

“We’re not going to engage the fleet directly.” Gull stated while flipping a switch to jettison a scatter mine out the back of his ship; a disc-shaped capsule that opened up to launch a wide spread of smaller explosive capsules. “We have to go to ground somewhere we can engage with the Cabal directly.” Chancing a glance at the Harvesters that flew straight into the minefield he created, Gull’s eyes were then drawn to something on the surface of Deimos. “Maybe down there.”

“Down where?” Mira asked as her jumpship sped by. “The moon?”

“Yeah, there. That structure – whatever it is.”

“Orbital scans seem to suggest it’s a Cabal shipyard.” Mira’s Ghost explained over the radio. “A kind of dry-dock to build and repair their cruisers warships – likely where they made this fleet.”

“Shipyard, huh?” the Hunter thought to himself for a second before rocketing back into action as the port-side of his ship was hit. “If it’s a Cabal base, maybe they’ve got a powerful enough Comms. Station down there to get a message back to the city. Even if they don’t it’s better than flying around up here.”

There was a moment of silence where the two Guardians focussed on piloting their ships before Mira spoke up again. “That’s actually not a bad idea.”

“Yeah, well you’ll find that I’m full of good ideas.”

“Yeah, and full of shit.” Mira muttered softly.

“What was that, Warlock? I didn’t quite catch that.” Gull lied.

“I said to follow my lead going in.” Mira replied with the ease of a practiced back-talker. “My jumpship is programmed with counter-manoeuvres to avoid Cabal ship-to-ship fire.”

“Yeah, well so is this pilot.” Gull replied before pulling away in a daring barrel-roll, spinning between a barrage of rockets and accelerated magnetic slugs.

“I believe the advice when piloting a ship is to be able to look where you’re going,” His Ghost told him as it appeared in the cockpit next to his head. “-Because I don’t know how you see anything while spinning this fast.”

Gull let out a jovial, adrenaline-fuelled chuckle as he pulled the jumpship in for a loop. “That’s because you haven’t had the flying experience I’ve had, so let me fly and patch the Comms. into an open Guardian-channel broadcast.”

A couple seconds passed in near-silence before his Ghost made a small noise to indicate that he was done. “Patched in. Feel free to shout for help as loud as you want.”

The Hunter huffed in mock-annoyance before pressing the button for the microphone and speaking while focussing most of his attention on avoiding the hailstorm of ordinance coming his way. “This is Gunslinger Gull calling to any nearby Guardians – requesting immediate aid, over.” He waited a good four seconds for a reply, but when he was met only with silence he tried again. “This is Gunslinger Gull, any Guardians within range respond – please. We are taking fire and desperately need support.”

After another second of silence, Gull was about to send out another broadcast just in case no one had been listening that time when an all too familiar voice came across the other end. “Hello? Dad, is that you?”

“What the- Beta?” Gull asked, dumbfound by the sudden twist in their situation.

“Oh, sorry. It’s just new Hunter friend.” The Exo’s tone was one of disappointment. “I’m hanging up.”

Launching into a panic, Gull momentarily forgot that he was avoiding enemy fire. “No, no, no! Beta wait – I need your help!” The Hunter took a moment to consider what he should say before a thought came to mind. “Wait, how are you picking this up?”

“I don’t know. I’m just drifting over Mars, y’know, admiring all the wonderful…red. Yeah, this planet’s really red. Then you started talking and I fell out of my chair. Ah, say, do you want to hang out some time? I’ll bet you’re pretty busy most days, but if you’ve got any openings in your schedule-”

“Yes – hang out! Now’s actually a good time! I’ll send you my-” A violent shudder that felt like it would shake apart his jumpship briefly caused Gull to stop talking to take notice of the now-smoking port-side engine. “Send you my coordinates. Say, is your Ghost there? I’d like to talk to it for a moment.”

“His name’s Copperhead and he’s a _he_!”

“Oh, just give me that damn mic!” Copperhead shouted in the background before his voice came through much clearer. “Hey, Gull right? What’s going on, you sound distressed?”

“Uh, Cabal. Big fleet! Attacking us. Quantum field. Can’t escape! Landing on Deimos. Send help!” Gull hastily replied as several warning messages popped up on the screens in front of him.

“Huh,” the Ghost exclaimed before replying with a proper response. “Don’t worry. We’re en-route. Try to stay alive and I hope for the Traveller’s sake you have a plan.” With that, the communication line cut off and Gull was left to focus on the rapidly-approaching surface of Deimos.

While the Hunter was not sure if he should have felt relieved or not that reinforcements were coming, he felt that the Warlock was at least obliged to know. _Besides, it might get a good scare out of her._ He thought while switching the communication frequencies back to the other jumpship. “Hey, Mira, I’ve got good news and maybe bad news.” He announced.

“I know,” the Warlock replied in an apprehensive tone. “I…tapped into your ship’s communication systems.”

Though he knew he should feel angered that the Warlock had essentially hacked his jumpship, Gull just couldn’t bring himself to it after everything that had just occurred. “So you…heard everything?”

“Yeah,” Gull wasn’t sure, but for a second he thought he heard Mira audibly swallow over the other end of the line. “-This should be interesting.”

* * *

**3km above Cabal Shipbase Ares…**

“Mira, at the velocity we’re going at, you’ll only have a couple of seconds to pull off a landing manoeuvre before we crash. I advise slowing down – immediately.” Mira’s Ghost warned her as she watched Cabal projectiles zip right by her cockpit, the nose of her jumpship angled right for the shipyard on the moon’s surface.

The Deimos landscape looked very much like the rocky, sandy dunes of the planet it orbited. However, Deimos’ terrain was a lot more of a grey and brownish-red; a physical difference that showed the lack of rust and iron in the moon’s composition – much like its sister: Phobos.

“Slow down? And give the Cabal crack-shots a chance to hit us?” Mira asked back sarcastically. “Not a chance.” With a strong tug on the controls, the Warlock lurched the jumpship to one side while simultaneously firing off another round of disruptor flares. “How much further to the base?”

“We’re two and a half kilometres above the base. I’m still scanning for a landing platform, but-” her Ghost paused as a bunch of lights and alarms all across her dashboard began going off. “That’s not good.”

“What is it?”

“It appears we are being locked on to by surface-to-air defence emplacements all around the shipyard.” Her Ghost explained in a calm, neutral tone.

“Great,” Mira muttered to herself. Incoming fire quickly started coming from both behind and in front of her jumpship, but the Warlock never slowed down even as her Ghost located the shipyard’s landing pads. Instead, the Warlock took the ship down to less than a kilometre above the base before angling the ship ever so slightly to take it into a curve that would have it fly right over the landing pad. “Ghost, get ready to transmat us exactly three metres below the ship on my mark.”

“This is insane!” Her Ghost exclaimed in worry. “There’s too many variables to account for. We _might_ transmat out at the same speed the ship is going, then who knows if I’ll be able to revive you once we’re down there or not.”

“Just do it!” Mira ordered while switching the ship’s control to auto-pilot, locking it’s altitude when it levelled out parallel to the ground. Since her ship was not equipped with the software to time a drop – because Mira had never considered using the ‘Laughing Behind Your Back’ for bombing runs, but it was not at the forefront of her list of modifications for the ship, the Warlock would have to time the jump herself.

As her Ghost had already described, it was a hard enough job _without_ the jumpship flying at top speed and Mira would only have a narrow window for a safe drop.

“Gull, I’m closing in on the landing platform. How are you holding up?” she asked in order to kill time before her window of opportunity. During the approach to the Firebase, Mira had lost track of the Hunter in favour of focussing on not getting shot down and was – admittedly – a little worried that he might not have made it.

“Uh, my ship’s a little banged up and it’s going to be a rough landing, but I’m still flying.” Gull replied in an exasperated voice before quietly mumbling, “Aw, shit. Amanda’s gonna kill me.”

“We need to secure the landing pad for when Beta arrives. I trust you won’t take your time and leave me to fend for myself for _too_ long?”

“You say that like I’m half-an-hour away – I’m like right behind you, unless you’re telling me you can’t hold out for, like, three seconds.”

“I trust myself to make it there.” Mira shot back with a smirk, though she knew the Hunter could not see it. “You still haven’t given me a reason to trust your punctuality.”

“Uh, Mira. I see a problem with your landing strategy.” Her Ghost piped up as the jumpship got closer and closer to the landing platforms. “There are Cabal infantry units and ships all over the landing pads, many of them ready to take off and all of them getting ready to fire at us.”

“Yes, that is to be expected, given that they _are_ the Cabal,” The Warlock mused casually as her hand hovered over the controls to transmat her to the set coordinates outside of her jumpship. “-We’ll just have to overcome them by adapting to the situation – like any other problem.”

“How are you so calm right now?” her Ghost practically pleaded for an answer.

In truth, Mira was far from calm, but the Awoken Warlock managed to cope with the stress of the situation by looking at it as if it were another practical formula that could be solved. It took all she had to keep her fears at bay, and she definitely was not about to share them with her Ghost. “Well, we either land safely or get splattered, in which case it’s out of our hands.”

As the jumpship finally reached its narrow opening and its shields finally gave out from the barrage of shots that scraped it, Mira barely heard her Ghost say, “Why me?” as she hit the button to transmat and found herself free-falling a second later.

Fortunately, she only teleported twenty metres off the ground and managed to break her fall with a glide while using her scout rifle to pick off Cabal Legionnaires on the ground. On the descent alone, the Warlock managed to kill three Legionnaires, a Phalanx and cripple another Legionnaire by shooting its legs.

In her sweep of the landing platform, Mira got a good look at the exterior of the Cabal shipyard from her vantage point. Its architecture was very similar to one of the Cabal’s larger firebases in the Rubicons of Mars, albeit a lot lower than the others. It bore the same colour schemes of white and grey, likely armoured with dense metal plating that could withstand orbital bombardments while also sporting dozens of artillery cannons. Additionally, much of the base’s area seemed to be taken up by a low, wide structure that was likely much deeper than its surface appearance implied. _Must be where they assemble their warships,_ Mira thought to herself.

As soon as her feet touched the ground, Mira immediately ran for cover behind an Interceptor, firing with calm precision at the Cabal soldiers surrounding her and slowly closing in. “Great, now we’re surrounded.” Mira’s Ghost remarked as she had to duck down to avoid a salvo of smart rockets.

“Just focus on getting the ship out of here – if we happen to find a way home, I want my ride to come with me.” Mira ordered while throwing out a grenade to provide a momentary respite while she switched communication frequencies to talk to the Hunter. “Gull, where’s my support?”

The sound of the Interceptor she was hiding behind immediately brought Mira’s focus back to the present moment. Looking up, she was surprised to see that a Centurion had climbed up on top of the vehicle and now towered over her. In a panic, the Sunsinger raised her hand to blast the Centurion back, but wasn't fast enough to stop the hulking foot-soldier from firing a salvo of explosive rounds straight at her, blowing the Warlock off the ground and sending her tumbling through the air for a good five seconds before hitting the platform again. When she turned to run the other way, Mira found her escape blocked by a wall of Cabal soldiers, protecting one another with their heavy blast shields as they closed in on her.

Just as Mira considered using her Radiance to get out of there, the sound of heavy repeating guns tore through the air as a barrage of white-hot plasma rounds tore through the Cabal ranks and a Kestrel-class interceptor hit the platform, sliding forward with its momentum and flattening the Centurion that had attacked Mira against the ship and the Interceptor. While the jumpship continued to slide against the platform, Gull suddenly materialised in its wake, tumbling before righting himself and taking aim with his pulse rifle.

With a sigh, Mira picked herself back up and made her way over to the Hunter, firing at a couple Cabal soldiers that were scattered by Gull’s attack. “Took you long enough.” She remarked while reloading her rifle.

“Uh, I’m here aren’t I?” Gull barked back, turning to face the Awoken while also flicking a knife at an approaching Legionnaire. The knife struck the foot-soldier in the head, killing it instantly – all without Gull looking directly at it. “And did you not see the thing I did with my ship? I took out eight Cabal troops in a single dive!” he yelled while gesturing to the crashed and smoking ‘Rope To Heaven’. “So I believe what you mean to say is ‘Thank you’.”

Sighing in exasperation, the Warlock switched out her scout rifle for her fusion rifle. “You Hunters are all alike.” She quickly loaded it with a fresh plasma canister while uttering a single word. “Six.”

“Six what?”

Mira quickly turned around while powering up the weapon in her hands, giving the cells time to cycle as she took aim at the group of Cabal corpses, firing just as a hand reached to grab one of the scattered shields. “You only killed six on your approach.” Mira elaborated while taking aim at another Legionnaire, the shot disintegrating its body into a gust of embers just like its comrade.

That made the Hunter shut up for a few seconds before he followed her up with, “Ok, don’t try to be smart with me, Warlock. I know it’s the only thing you’re good for, but maybe you could put it to better use – oh, I don’t know – figuring out how we’re going to contact the Earth and get off here.”

“Hey, it was your idea to come down here!”

“Because we would’ve died if we stayed in orbit – doesn’t mean I know the area.”

“I thought you Hunters had a sense for this sort of thing.”

“Oh, please, that’s a myth. No one has a sense that automatically maps out an area – like some kind of space sonar!” he paused. “We have a sense for traps, though.”

“Oh, give me a break.” At this point Mira’s head was resting against her free palm. “I’m not sure if I prefer this to a quiet death in the cold vacuum of space.”

“If you two are done arguing,” Gull’s Ghost interjected, appearing between the two Guardians. “-There should be a terminal in the factory that I can hack into to get any information we need about this place.”

“He’s right,” Mira’s Ghost appeared next to its counterpart. “-It should solve a number of our problems at once, assuming you two are ready to move out.”

The two Guardians, stunned by the forwardness of their Ghosts and feeling slightly embarrassed at being called out for arguing like children, could only glance between each other and their Ghost for a few seconds before Mira decided to speak up.

Before she could say anything, however, the roar of several engines caused the two Guardians to turn their attention to the squadron of Harvesters bearing down on them from above, as well as the numerous Harvesters on the ground getting ready to take off. “First thing’s first;” Gull stated, resolve in his tone. “-We’ve got to take the landing pad – wait for Beta to arrive. I don’t think I’m being modest when I say we won’t be able to take the facility without him.”

Mira swapped out her weapons again as she spoke. “Agreed. I’ll take the ones on the ground, you take the ones in the-” the Warlock stopped when a deafening alarm suddenly sounded throughout the shipyard. Looking over in the direction of the main entrance to the facility’s factory, Mira noticed the alarm above it flash red before the heavy double doors slid open and a legion of Cabal troops stormed out.

“Oh shit.” The two Guardians said in unison – Mira cursing in old Russian instead of English.

“Uh,” Gull exclaimed while looking back between the two walls of Cabal soldiers, feeling very much caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. “-Ok, new plan. I’ll take care of the air support. You keep factory security busy.”

This time, the Warlock shot him a look of genuine concern, though Gull couldn’t see it from under her helmet. “You sure you can handle all of them?”

The Hunter hesitated in his reply before both Guardians had to dodge out of the way of a salvo of rockets fired their way. “No, not really.” Gull finally said over their paired frequency. “But at this point I think it’s too late for either of us to tap out.”

From under her Warlock hood, Mira let out an amused huff while taking aim at a few Cabal Legionnaires sticking out a little too far. “I’m sure if you ask nicely they might take you prisoner.” She said sarcastically.

“And let them have the satisfaction of surrendering?” Gull shot back with a chuckle. “They’ll have to skin me first – probably will, considering how many of them _I’ve_ skinned.”

“Again, something easily accomplished merely by asking.” Mira quipped before fully turning her attention back to the battle at hand.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two Guardians fight for their lives on a Cabal dry-dock, while another Guardian races reach them and provide aid before it is too late.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Good golly, it feels good to be uploading another chapter. I know, it's been a while since the last one came out, I've been slacking and I need to pick things up. I just wanted to let everyone know, new or old, that this fic is NOT DEAD. It will never die unless I explicitly say so, so please don't give up on me.
> 
> As always, Kudos and comments are always a great motivator for me, and feel free to leave your thoughts and reviews for the story so far, or wherever it decides to go from here.

**55,000 Km over Shipbase Metus, Deimos...**

High above the Cabal shipyard on Mars’ second moon, a small cluster of debris leftover from several ships that met an unfortunate end above Mars orbited around Deimos. Among them was an intact and working Guardian ship, hidden from the Cabal fleet by having powered down its engines and switching off all electronic equipment, save for the orbital scanners.

Through the view-screen of the ship’s cockpit, a bronze-coloured Ghost stared out at the various Cabal warships that hung over them as well as the light Harvester dropships that dove towards the moon’s surface. “Uh, Beta,” the Ghost spoke with a hint of worry in its tone. “I _really_ think we shouldn’t be here.” It said while turning to face his Guardian. “I mean, don’t get me wrong; it’s cool why you’re doing this, but don’t you think there’s a safer place to triangulate Gull’s position? Somewhere not under the nose of a Cabal battle fleet – preferably.”

The Exo Titan didn’t turn his attention away from his ship’s display as he replied to his Ghost. “I mean, yeah, it’s pretty uncomfortable. But the army of space turtles would probably notice if we tried anything funny. Then it’s nothing but kaboom city with no stops along the way.”

“Urgh, I hate it when you’re right.” Copperhead replied with a sigh as he peeled his one optic away from the swarm of Cabal ships that hung all around them.

“I’m always right!” Beta stated proudly before pointing at the display in front of him. “Now come over here and tell me what this means because I have been staring at it for three minutes and sixteen seconds, and still have no idea what I’m looking at.”

With another sigh, Copperhead floated across the large cockpit to look at the display from over Beta’s shoulder. “Ok, yeah. I see what’s up.”

“What?”

“The scanner’s not on.” The Titan made a noise of understanding as Copperhead directly interfaced with the ship’s computers to calibrate the scanners himself. “Ok, here we go,” the Ghost commented as the display started to show readings in real-time. “Oh, well, that’s not good.”

“Are we still clowning?” Beta’s eyes narrowed in suspicion, wary of his Ghost in case he tried to pull a fast one on him – again.

“No clowning this time,” Copperhead reassured him before suddenly projecting a light from his eye like a laser-pointer. “See that blue dot?”

“Yeah?”

“That’s about where Gull and Mira are.” The laser dot on the screen moved in a circle around the blue dot. “Now, see all those red dots? Those are the Cabal.”

At first, Beta let out a thoughtful hum as he began counting the red dots in his head, but gasped with his eyes widening when he realised the number was more than eight. “They’re gonna get swarmed!” He then spun to face the flight controls at incredible speeds. “We gotta get down there and help!”

“Hang on a sec, Beta.” Copperhead interjected while flying right in front of the Exo’s face. “I want you to think about this for a second – like, really _think_ about this. The second we fire up the engines, the Cabal are gonna know we’re here and run us right into the moon. We managed to get this far by sticking close to the space trash, keeping our engines low and coming in from the Cabal’s blind-spot.”

“That’s what she said.”

“But if try to get down there without taking the long way around, we’ll be buzzing right in their faces,” Copperhead continued, ignoring Beta’s interruption. “-And there’s no way our ship can hold out under their firepower.”

Staring intently at the Ghost – while actually looking like he was considering Copperhead’s words, Beta lifted one hand to massage his jaw while the old processors in his head audibly whirred. He hummed in thought as he got up and spun around several times in place, actively thinking for a change since his Ghost was so insistent on it.

As far as the Titan was concerned, however, there was only one thing he had to worry about; and it was with that thought that an idea came to mind. “What if we’re not on the ship when those space turtles start chasing it?”

“What?” Copperhead exclaimed, confused. “How are we going to get down on Deimos – let alone anywhere – if we’re not on the ship?”

“You can still do that auto-pilot thingy with the ship while we’re not on it, right?” Beta asked his Ghost, completely blocking out what his Ghost said as the idea slowly came together brilliantly in his mind.

“Well, yeah. How do you think it always manages to find us while we’re on the ground?” the Ghost asked rhetorically.

“So, if we jump out of the ship when them Cabal dudes notice us, and you keep flying it, they won’t notice us as we make our way down to the moon!” Beta finished, the pride in his tone evident at the brilliance of his plan.

Copperhead said nothing for a second before suddenly glowing brightly in shock. “Wait, hold on – repeat that first part again!”

“It’s genius, I know!” Without warning, Beta quickly hopped back into the pilot’s seat of the jumpship, leaving Copperhead baffled for a second before the Ghost caught on to his plan.

“Beta, wait!” the Ghost flew to hover right in front of his face. “You can’t seriously be thinking of falling all the way to the surface of Deimos!”

“Ignition!” Beta announced before firing up the ship’s engines, directing it straight for the Cabal shipyard below.

“Beta, no! This is crazy!” Not eight seconds later did the ship’s proximity sensors start blaring with warnings that several other ships were on an intercept course. “We’re going to die – for real this time!”

“Not if the plan works!” The Exo shouted to be heard over the sirens blaring around them.

“The plan is the reason we’re going to die!” an impact caused the ship to shudder briefly before Beta righted their trajectory. “We’re taking fire!”

“Just a little…closer…” Beta’s eyes narrowed in determination as more shots made contact and shook the ship to its core once the shields gave out.

Copperhead’s single eye darted around frantically as panels sparked and instruments overheated, the whole system overloaded from the strain of Beta pushing the engines to the max while the shields took a relentless pounding. “We can’t take any more hits.”

“Then it’s time to jump.” His metal fist hovered over the emergency transmat button as he said this.

“No, it is _not_ time to jump! It’s _never_ time to jump!”

“Jumping!” Beta yelled before hitting the button, causing his form to flicker briefly before it was enveloped by white light, before he suddenly found himself falling towards the moon’s surface as the jumpship, soared overhead with several Cabal Harvesters in tow, its autopilot still functioning well enough.

“Man, this plan is turning out great!” Beta said to himself as he folded his hands behind his head and allowed gravity to pull him towards Deimos’ surface.

“If the plan was to be a crater of Exo parts on Mars’ second moon, then yeah, it’s turning out great!” Copperhead yelled sarcastically, though his shouting was not as panicked anymore. Though still mad, it would take at least another four minutes before they hit the ground – more than enough time to come up with a plan to save the both of them. Getting angry and yelling the whole way down would just be a waste of precious time.

Plus, free-falling _was_ kinda fun, especially free-falling in silence thanks to Deimos’ thin, artificial atmosphere.

“Alright; part two of the plan!” Beta announced.

“I already hate part two.” The Ghost deadpanned.

“Later. First, show me where that Cabal base is.” Beta commanded, to which Copperhead complied with only some grumbling. A waypoint marker appeared a second later in Beta’s vision, placed over the rapidly approaching surface of Deimos.

“I don’t see why you want me to mark it out; you can practically see it from here!” Copperhead grumbled briefly as another readout appeared next to it: the distance to the waypoint.

Which was fast approaching, if the numbers ticking down were any indication.

“Next step,” Beta continued. “We use the Lift to line us up good.” He explained before swerving to one side, his legs giving off trails of light as he willed the Light in his armour to give him that extra bit of force behind his momentum.

“Wait, yes! This is good!” Copperhead’s tone suddenly changed to one of hopefulness. “If we wait until the last second, we can slow our fall enough that we might be able to get out with just a broken leg.”

“Hold up, slow down?” Beta asked while looking to his shoulder as if his Ghost were there. “But that’s not step three.” Arc energy then began to spark across the Titan’s body as he positioned himself so that both his fists were stretched out before him. “Step three,” streaks of lightning began surging off Beta as his fall suddenly picked up speed before suddenly, his mind was clear of all other thought but wreaking havoc. “-Is to speed _up_!”

Like a meteor entering a planet’s atmosphere, Beta’s falling form fell at a speed exceeding Mach one in seconds as a burst of Arc energy exploded outwards where he was just a moment ago.

At this point, Copperhead could swear he was screaming, but no other sound reached his auditory sensors over the sound of the Arc energy coming off Beta in waves.

“Step…four.” Beta struggled to get the words out as his face was battered by the rushing winds. “Aim…for…the Space Turtles!”

“Why didn’t you do step four before step three?” His Ghost shouted in his ear. “And why didn’t you tell me about step three?!”

“Guess…I’ll just…have to…eyeball it!”

“Argh, Goddammit! We’re gonna die!”

* * *

**10,000 Km away, Shipbase Metus, Deimos...**

The scout rifle in Mira’s hands finally clicked dry the next time she pulled the trigger, indicating that she had emptied her magazine trying to break the defensive stance of the Cabal Phalanx that had been pushing her back.

Obviously, that plan didn’t work out as hoped.

As if it were somehow able to hear the Warlock’s rifle clicking dry over the constant gunfire around them, the Phalanx stopped being so defensive and began to advance faster on Mira with the apparent intention of smacking her with its shield.

With her back to a stack of crates tall enough for her to leap over – but with much more than one Phalanx on the other side of it, Mira was cornered like a rat with no clear way of getting by the hulking Cabal soldier without running the risk of leaving herself vulnerable to it.

That was, until a grenade was lobbed a few paces behind the Phalanx from out of nowhere and exploded in a pulse of scorching light, causing the Cabal soldier to stumble forward and right into Mira’s outstretched hand. The force behind the blast that left her hand sent a shockwave through the Phalanx’s whole body and crumpled its helmet inward. As it tumbled backwards and collapsed, Mira took her chance to reload before jumping atop its body and scanning the airfield for targets.

The doors that had released a garrison of soldiers on the two Guardians had closed as soon as the last of the garrison’s ranks had filed out, and had remained shut since. This, at least, gave Mira some reassurance that there may not be as many Cabal stationed on the shipyard itself as she had feared, as they would have deployed any reinforcements they had to spare by this point. Additionally, this gave her a set number of Cabal troopers that she had to kill before she could consider the situation to be ‘Under Control’.

Over the past three minutes that she and Gull had been firing at the Cabal, she estimated that she’d only gotten through one fifth of the shipyard’s garrison.

Their lack of cover made it no small feat to stay alive: the two Guardians having to rely on their greater mobility over their adversaries to avoid being blown to bits by the waves of Cabal soldiers that fell on them.

From what she could tell through quick, observational glances, Gull was handling himself relatively well – only needing her aid in culling troop deployments four times so far. At the moment, he was taking cover behind a downed Harvester just a few metres from her position, one he had shot down with three direct hits from his Golden Gun to its engine. Even from the distance between them, the Warlock could tell that Gull was an experienced Hunter after watching him a few times when she had the chance.

If by nothing else, it showed by how quickly his hands moved when swapping magazines or firearms.

Mira’s attention quickly snapped back to the battle at hand when a couple smart-rockets zipped by her, fired by the Cabal infantry looking to surround the two Guardians. After throwing out a Solar grenade at the feet of the front-line Legionnaires to cover her escape, the Warlock backpedalled while firing to put some distance between her and the hulking shock-troopers before taking off at a sprint to get to Gull.

Gunfire came from every direction as she ran, but Mira didn’t fire back – knowing that all it would do was slow her down and waste ammo. For the most part, the Warlock was able to make it to the downed Cabal dropship without taking too much fire, only getting clipped on the shoulder once by a Psion gunman.

When she reached Gull’s side, he was too busy firing around the bend of the ship to notice her at first, and swung his pulse rifle to aim at her when she approached. Mira exclaimed in surprise and raised her hands to her side when he did, causing the Gunslinger to immediately relax and lower his rifle.

“Some warning would be nice next time.” He quipped before going back to unloading the rest of his clip before taking cover next to her.

“Do you always hold your allies at gun-point, or do you really think so much of me?” she asked back as a micro-rocket clipped the edge of her cover and caused her shielding to flicker when loose shrapnel bounced against her.

The Hunter quickly threw out one of his spare knives at a Psion that had rounded the corner of their cover, striking the psychic alien in the head, before responding. “Nah, it’s just you. Well, you and the few Guardians who thought it would be funny to sneak up on me.”

Mira could not tell if the words were supposed to be sarcastic or annoyed, given the heavy breaths of exhaustion Gull managed between words. She didn’t have much time to ponder the question, however, as the low roar of another Harvester dropship right over them reached her ears. Looking up and preparing to fire on any Cabal infantry that dropped out of it, the Warlock was shocked to see its heavy weapon systems powering up and turning in their direction. “Um…”

“We need to move – like right now!” Gull half-shouted, urging Mira with a tug on her shoulders before he broke cover a second ahead of her. Just as the two Guardians started running, the dropship rained down heavy fire on where they were just seconds ago, obliterating their makeshift cover in just a few salvos.

When the thundering of heavy rockets stopped, Mira and Gull found themselves back at square one as the Sunsinger frantically searched for cover while projectiles flew at them from all around. She cursed under her breath, however, when all she saw on the air-pad around them were the Cabal – both dead and alive.

Any cover that might have provided them some protection had been reduced to smouldering rubble, or was too small to even be considered ‘functional’.

In the time Mira spent taking in their surroundings and analysing the situation, her shields were quickly depleted by oncoming fire, unaware as she was while her mind ran at a thousand miles a second. The Warlock hardly fired her weapon as she focussed on analysing their situation, transfixed by her thoughts long enough that Gull had to shake her back to attention with a hard shove, narrowly avoiding what would have been a fatal blow from a Legionary’s slug rifle.

“Snap out of it, Warlock!” Gull shouted in between burst from his pulse rifle. “ _Both_ of us need to be shooting if we hope to last longer than a couple seconds.”

The answer hit her then and there: the solution to get them out of this mess and, hopefully, live long enough to achieve what they came here to do. Without a word of warning, she strapped the rifle in her hands to her back before taking off at a sprint towards a group of approaching Phalanxes. The Light coursed through her body as she leapt in the air and unleashed her Radiance, raining down pulses of Solar energy on the infantry below her and burning past their defences.

As she landed, she quickly turned to Gull and spoke hastily. “I’m going to create an opening. When you see it, take it – get off the shipyard and get as far as you can.”

The Hunter hesitated briefly as the barrage of oncoming fire resumed before replying. “What about you?” He shouted to be heard over the roar of the guns firing at them, narrowly ducking under a micro-rocket that would have taken his head off.

Mira opened her mouth to reply, but was cut short when a couple of shots hit her in the side. The damage the blows did to her armour began to heal almost as quickly thanks to the Aura of Light that surrounded her. She then lobbed a charged grenade out in the direction the shots came from before turning her full attention to the hordes of Cabal infantry – now holding their position in anticipation of her attack.

“Don’t worry about me,” she said with a mirthless chuckle as the Sunsinger flexed her hands and felt the light of the sun grow at her fingertips. “-In fact, I’d be more worried about-”

“Hey, say something if you can hear me!” A familiar voice suddenly cut across the communication line, causing Mira’s words to catch in her throat. “Hello? Anyone there? For the Traveler’s sake, please be alive!”

“What the- Copperhead?” Gull replied before Mira could even think of something to say, still surprised at being interrupted in the middle of an impressive monologue. “How are you on this line? Where-”

“No time to explain!” the Ghost interrupted again. “Backup’s coming – and it’s coming in real fast!”

“W- How fast?” Mira asked, the distress she was feeling clear in her tone.

“Really, _really_ fast. Like _right now_ fast!”

“Right n-what’s your position?” Gull asked this time, pretty much ignoring everything around him – even as he was struck square in the shoulder by a micro-rocket.

It was then that Mira felt it; a subtle change in the energy that seemed to bend and warp the pressure and gravity around them, thickening the ozone in front of her almost to the point that Mira could feel it between her fingertips. It was similar to the feeling she got when enough Voidwalkers unleashed simultaneous Nova Bombs; the hairs at the back of her neck would rise up and a chill would travel up her spine, spurring her into action even though she only had a loose idea where the change was coming from.

Then, Copperhead spoke.

“Look. Up.”

Initially, all Mira did was cast a quick glance at the sky, hoping to glimpse what the Ghost was referring to while keeping her attention on the battle around them. Instead, her eyes widened as they focussed on the glowing, blue projectile plummeting straight towards them.

The meteor-like object heading towards them shone brighter than the sun and reminded her too much of a Warsat falling from orbit. Only this time, Mira knew that the projectile was packing a heavy payload – one that could kill half of everything exposed on the air-pad.

Not to mention, as it passed overhead, Mira could have sworn she heard the projectile screaming.

She didn’t even have time to swear – or say anything for that matter – as the projectile collided with the air-pad’s surface, causing a massive tremor that nearly shook Mira off-balance before it was followed with a shockwave of Arc energy. Briefly, the Warlock even saw the Cabal infantry closest to the impact site get obliterated upon contact, before the wave that followed surged through the ranks of the Cabal. The ones that did not disintegrate immediately were hit by a wave of Arc lightning that threw them off their feet and knocked them over like fat, heavily armoured dominoes. Not even the airborne Harvesters were safe as the shockwave expanded in all directions hit them with enough turbulence to send them tumbling to the ground.

A second after the Arc shockwave passed over her, a wave of dust particulate followed in its wake and Mira had to raise her arms out in front of her to shield her helmet as her robes fluttered in the wake of the sudden dust storm. When it passed, however, the Sunsinger was shocked to see that – in the place of the Cabal garrisons there just a second ago, all that remained was a crater surrounded by dead Cabal and empty pieces of armour. The Legionnaires and Phalanxes that had been lucky enough to be on the outside of the blast crawled about on their hands feebly as they reached for their weapons and struggled to get back up.

The realisation of what had just happened began to settle in, and Mira’s arms slumped at her sides in disappointment as her Radiance ended – her Sunsinger flames fizzling out anti-climactically as she stewed in her frustration.

A couple seconds passed in near-silence before Gull came limping over, keeping his weight off his left foot as he made his way to Mira’s side. “Was that just…”

“Yeah, I think so.” Mira replied numbly, barely aware of her own words.

“And did he just…”

“Yeah, I think so.” She repeated.

The two Guardians lapsed briefly into silence as their attention was drawn to a lone Legionary a few metres from them, crawling forward on his arms to reach a discarded slug rifle just a few feet from him. As soon as he got within arms-reach of the weapon, Gull levelled his rifle from the hip at the Legionary’s head and fired off a single burst, killing the Cabal soldier as his helmet popped off and a jet of oil spurted out. “Well it worked, I guess.” Gull eventually said after taking his finger off the trigger.

“I really don’t know whether to be endlessly frustrated, or relieved that at the very least our…’problem’, has been resolved.” Mira thought to herself, a quiet growl escaping through her teeth as they clenched together in annoyance.

Several groans of pain around them drew Gull’s attention as he realised that while the blast had done a number on the Cabal on the air-pad, many of them had just been knocked over or briefly hampered by the Arc shockwave, and were now getting back up. “Well, figure it out soon, cause it looks like some of our _friends_ are getting back up.” The Hunter skipped a small distance from Mira before stopping to turn and address her once more. “I’ll mop up the ones on the outside. You go check on Beta and I’ll meet you by the factory entrance.”

Gull took off immediately after that, while Mira took her time to let out a frustrated sigh before making her way to the centre of the crater at a leisurely pace, finishing off any Cabal soldiers still moving with her fusion rifle on the way.

The walk proved useful to help the Warlock let her frustrations simmer down little by little with each Cabal soldier she disintegrated, until she was finally able to let it all go with one big sigh as she spotted the first signs of a heavy impact on the airfield. A few seconds later and Mira was at the lip of the shallow crater, at the centre of which hovered a Ghost with its shell extended in a ball of Light.

She picked her way over to it as her feet danced across the cracks in the ground before she was finally within arm’s reach of the Ghost. Then, extending her Light through her outstretched hand, she channelled a small amount of the energy that flowed through her into the Ghost. It was not much, but it was enough to get the bronze shell pieces to start spinning before it gave a small flash of light as it came together.

When Mira opened her eyes again, the Ghost was gone, and instead Beta appeared – lying flat on the ground with his arms outstretched. “Beta Tauri?” Mira asked, concern evident in her voice as the Titan kept his eyes to the sky without moving an inch. “Are you alright?”

The sudden jerk of motion Beta made when he arched his back and gasped for air was so abrupt that Mira involuntarily took a step backwards. The action registered as even more shocking to Mira a second later when she remembered that Exos did not breathe. After his back hit the ground a moment later, the Titan shot up into a sitting position. “Dah!” his head turned up to face Mira as his mouth opened and closed rapidly for a couple seconds before words finally came out. “That…was… _awesome_!”

Sighing in both relief and exasperation, the Sunsinger put her hands to her hips after slinging her weapon over her shoulder. “He’s fine.” She said to anyone around within earshot, but mostly to her Ghost.

At her comment, the Warlock’s Ghost materialised over her shoulder. “I don’t think ‘fine’ is the right word for…however he feels.”

“Well, he looks fine to me.” Mira gestures towards Beta as he stumbles to his feet to emphasise her point.

“Whoo! That was so cool!” Beta cheered while pumping his fists in the air. He then turns to Mira once more before speaking in rapid-fire sentence bursts. “Did you see that? I cannot believe I did that with my eyes closed! How many did I get? Oh, please tell me you took a picture! No picture? Did you record it? Oh, let’s do it again!”

“Urgh, let’s not!” Copperhead groaned as he materialised over the Titan’s shoulder. “You scared the Light out of me, you metal-headed knucklehead!”

“I know right! I’d like to see any Golden Age rollercoaster top that!”

“Yeah, I don’t know what that is, but anything has to have been better than… _that!_ ”

“I didn’t even know a Titan could perform the Fist of Havoc from so high up.” Mira’s Ghost commented while Beta and Copperhead argued with one another, catching the Warlock’s eye as she spared her Ghost a glance.

“Me neither; even with that Death From Above technique Shaax always talks about, I don’t see how any Guardian would be able to maintain that much Light for that long.” Mira replied, partially thinking aloud. “Maybe it has something to do with Deimos’ gravity, or lack of atmosphere.”

“Or maybe Beta’s Light is stronger than you give him credit for.” Her Ghost let out a thoughtful hum before speaking again. “I suppose the only way to know for sure is to run some tests.”

“Yes!” Beta cheered.

“ _No!_ ” Copperhead yelled a split-second later. “ _Absolutely_ not!”

“Relax,” Mira affirmed with a chuckle. “-I didn’t say anything about asking for your help in this. I know a good many more Titans who would gladly volunteer to test my theory.”

“Yeah, I’m sure the FWC would just _love_ to turn their Titans into orbital missiles.” The Ghost muttered under its breath.

“What was that?” Mira asked. Despite her accusatory tone, she actually found the comment somewhat amusing.

“I said to be careful wherever you decide to conduct your mad Warlock science,” the Ghost corrected. “-Last thing we need is Tuesday’s forecast to be raining Titans.”

“Dude, that sounds awesome.” Beta said in a loud whisper.

Copperhead looked like he was about to say something else when Gull jogged over, his shoulders rising and dropping quickly with his rapid breaths. “Whew, I think I got the last of them.”

Sure enough, a quick visual sweep of the area revealed that none of the downed Cabal that remained were moving anymore. “So it would seem,” Mira commented analytically as she turned to face Gull. “-Undoubtedly, there will be more guards in the shipyard itself, but we’ll have to go through them if we have any hope of reaching the communication station here.”

“Well, that was the plan.” The Hunter mused while rolling his shoulders and lowering his rifle to his side. “C’mon, let’s go see if they’re accepting visitors.”

Gull was the first to start walking towards the large double doors of the shipyard, his posture more relaxed now even as he walked over a dead Phalanx as if it was not even there. Beta followed next after sharing a shrug with his Ghost, while Mira turned to look at her Ghost and speak before her feet started to move. “If we don’t die down here, remind me to put a tracker on both of them.”

“What for?”

“So I keep two hundred metres away from both of them at all times.”

“Ah, of course,” her Ghost replied sarcastically. “-A productive use of our limited resources as always.”

“Hush, you.” The Warlock hissed at her Ghost right before it disappeared, unwilling to say anything in response.”

It did not take long for the three Guardians to reach the main entrance to the shipyard, coming face-to-face with the fifteen-metre high doors. After the garrison of troopers that had come out to meet them had passed through, the enormous doors had slid shut and have not opened since.

The door’s design was similar enough to most other Cabal architecture, and Mira was willing to bet it would be equally difficult to open by force.

Gull seemed to share her sentiment as he let a breath hiss out between his teeth. “So, anyone wanna try knocking?”

While Mira made no move to acknowledge the Hunter’s attempt at sarcasm, Beta immediately followed-up on the question by actually pounding his fist on the door twice, making a dull thudding sound with each hit. “Hello, anyone home? We’re just innocent, naïve girl scouts looking to offer you some cookies at a reasonable price.” Turning to face the two other Guardians, Beta lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper and holding a hand across his mouth to direct his voice. “We’re not actually girl scouts – or selling reasonably priced cookies, I’m just trying to make them think that so they’ll let us in.”

“Yes, you had us all fooled there, my metal friend.” Mira replied sarcastically, giving a visible eye-roll as her helmet moved with the motion.

“I didn’t mean actually try- forget it,” Gull admonished before stopping himself with a sigh. “-Let’s just find a way to get the doors open.” The Gunslinger suggested while putting his hand against the giant doors before them. “It’s at least two feet thick, with a second layer that’s supposed to open with the first. It’ll be too thick to cut through…maybe Beta could punch it open.”

“Say no more.” The Titan said right as he began cracking his knuckles.

“Or,” Mira chimed in, speaking louder to be heard over any bad decisions about to be made. “-We could try hacking the door controls.” A wave of her hand directed everyone to a wall-mounted console left of the doors, which she began walking towards without bothering to wait for the other two Guardians.

Once the Warlock was in front of the console, she held out her hand to summon her Ghost and begin slicing the programs. However, unlike most Guardians – who would’ve just stepped aside and let their Ghost do the work, Mira waved her Ghost aside just as it was about to interface with the console and put her hands to the keypad. “Alright, let’s see what we’re dealing with here.”

As she began carefully pressing buttons along the console’s screen, Gull quietly approached her from behind and peered over the Warlock’s shoulder to see what she was doing. At first, she didn’t actually notice him there, but once she did, Mira managed to ignore his presence for a good six seconds before speaking up.

“I’d appreciate it if you could give me some space while I work.” Mira commented with a bit of bite without turning her focus from the console in front of her.

“Just want to make sure you know what you’re doing.” Gull replied after a pause, taking a couple steps back so he could still peer over the Awoken’s shoulder. “…Do you know what you’re doing?”

“Of course I do,” Mira snapped back while her eyes pinched together in a leer when she found herself hitting a block in the system. “-It’s just been a while since I’ve had to do this.”

“If it’s going to take time, just let your Ghost do it.” The Hunter advised with irritation clear in his tone, his right foot unconsciously giving an impatient tap.

“Where’s the fun in that?” Mira asked rhetorically with a dry laugh. “Show some patience, Gull, I can work nearly as quick as most Ghost when it comes to Hive, Cabal and Fallen locks and data-walls – especially when another Guardian isn’t constantly pestering me to work faster.”

“I’m not asking you to work faster, I’m asking you to let your Ghost work faster.” Gull corrected, which Mira did not justify with a reply. A few more seconds passed by in silence before Gull let out a low growl. “This is taking too long.” Without warning, he unslung his rifle from his back and switched the safety off.

“What do you think you’re doing?!” Mira asked pointedly, noticing the motion out of the corner of her eye.

Pausing for a split-second, Gull held his weapon level with the Warlock’s shoulders before turning on the spot. “It’s not for you.” the Hunter jabbed at the air with the barrel of his rifle. “It’s for them.”

Curiosity getting the better of her, Mira put her current task on hold to turn her head and look where Gull was pointing. It took her less than half a second to spot what initially looked like a bunch of falling stars, but were actually a squadron of Cabal Harvesters heading straight for them.

Her senses and mind now on high alert, Mira’s head snapped back to the console in front of her as her fingers worked at twice their previous speed. “How many are there?”

“I count eight; each could be holding up to eleven foot soldiers, but they won’t even consider that to begin with.” Gull replied while quickly running over to the nearest Phalanx to drag its shield back to their position, his voice carrying across the communication line.

“How long do we have?” the words left her lips without the Warlock even realising she said them, every part of her thought-process focussed solely on hacking the console.

“Best guess is another nineteen seconds before they’re on us.” Her Ghost replied next to her, but the others were able to hear them over the shared frequency.

Out of her field of vision, Beta began pounding his fist on the large doors with more force and speed. “Open up, this is the police! We know you have illegally downloaded movies in there!”

“Stop fooling around, Warlock! Let your Ghost take over.” Gull yelled insistently as the distant thunder of engines began to reach Mira’s ears.

“No! I can do this,” the Awoken snapped back as her eyes and hand paused over the same icon, unsure if she missed a sequence in her rush. “-Just shut up and let me work.” A sigh of relief passed her lips when the console lit up with the clearance signal when her finger touched the bypass. However, in her rush to override the door controls, one of Mira’s fingers skimmed a button on the console, accidentally tripping a sensor in the security systems. The console flashed with red signals a second later, denying her any further access. “Dammit!”

“Dammit?” Copperhead parroted. “What do you mean ‘ _dammit_ ’?! What happened?”

“A security protocol was triggered,” Mira did not bother going into the details of how the system was activated, as the others didn’t need to know. “-I’ll have to open up a backdoor.”

“Forget that, let your Ghost take care of it and help me get a few shots on these bastards!” At this point, Gull had to yell to be heard over the roar of the engines from the Cabal dropships, though the Warlock suspected he would have yelled regardless of how loud the background noise was.

“Not while I’m still partially in.” With one hand on the console, Mira reached into a pocket in her robes with the other to pull out a magnetic data-stick and touch it to the console, causing it to magnetise to the terminal’s surface while it streamed her custom-made programs into the mainframe.

The programs loading into the Cabal computer systems immediately begin drilling into the software to access the override by force. While effective, it also alerts the system’s security protocols to its attention, though it is able to drill as fast as the protocols can destroy it.

This, unfortunately, means that once loaded into the Cabal’s systems, the program will be lost – which is why Mira would have liked to save it for another occasion.

“Come on…come on…” Mira muttered under her breath as she watched the digital worm’s progress on the console.

“They’re priming the forward guns,” she heard Gull breathe out, though she was only paying him half her attention at this point. “-They’re going to hit us from above – we have to move!”

“I’m almost there!” The Warlock shouted.

“Forget the door, we’ll find another way in. We can’t do that if we’re dead!”

“Wait!” Beta suddenly yelled with his arms in front of him. “I have an idea!”

“Oh, Traveller, not another idea.” Copperhead groaned as Beta clapped his hands together and began rubbing them furiously, sparks of Arc energy coming off where his palms touched for a good four seconds before he suddenly pulled them apart and held them to the door.

“Open, sesame!” he yelled out as the Arc charge in his palms dissipated immediately, drawing the frustrated glares of everyone except the Warlock, who had her eyes fixed on the slicing progress of her programs.

She counted down the milliseconds in her head as the worm did its job before the console flashed orange with open access. “Yes!” she cried aloud, her finger jabbing for the door controls. “Doors are opening!”

The hiss of Cabal pressure locks was followed by small puffs of pressurised air from the door, right before the large central locking wheel began to turn.

“Wait, that worked?” Beta thought out loud before shaking his head and shouting in a louder voice. “I mean, yes! It worked! Just like I planned!”

“Great, whatever! We need to get inside, right now!” Gull yelled just as a few streaks of fire left the squad of Harvesters and rocketed over to them. “Squeeze through as soon as the doors open!”

Gull’s last few words were lost to the sound of salvos of rockets hitting the ground around them as the three Guardians faced the full firepower of the squadron of gunships.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With the Guardians entrenched on all sides with no way out, the Cabal might just be the least of their problems. With new grudges still fresh, burying the hatchet between them might prove just as difficult as fighting the Cabal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: So, apologies are in order, I suppose. It shouldn't have taken me this long to get this chapter out, and this time I've got assurance the next one won't take as long. That's where the other apology comes in: this part of the story turned out to be longer than I expected, so, to save you the trouble of having to read for half an hour, I cut what I wrote up into two chapters. So, yeah, this is the short half of the chapter (I say short, but the next chapter is like 3x as long as this one).
> 
> Don't worry, three days tops for the next chapter.

**Cabal Shipbase Metus, Deimos, in orbit around Mars…**

“Now, go! It’s wide enough!”

“Argh, dammit! Beta’s hit!”

“Get through the doors, I’ll get him!”

“Alright – I’m through. I’ll try to draw their fire.”

“Don’t. You’ll just waste ammo!”

“The doors are still opening!”

“Mira, start the closing sequence.”

“Where’s the bloody terminal?”

“C’mon, Beta. We’re almost there!”

“Ah, I can’t feel my face! Is it still there?”

“Of course it’s still there, idiot. Now move!”

“Mira, give me a hand with this!”

“I see the door controls. I’ll have them ready to shut as soon as you make it through.”

“Urgh, fine! Beta, get over here!”

With one hand to prop up the two-hundred kilogram Cabal shield against the ground, Gull was giving everything he had to half-drag Beta towards the door. It was only a few metres to the crack in the doors, but with explosions and fire raining all around them, moving was nearly impossible and made no less difficult by having to carry extra weight as he went.

Even he was surprised he had made it this far, but he chalked it up to the additional strength his Light granted him. _Wish the Light would help get rid of the pain, at least._ He thought to himself while gritting his teeth. _Extra strength or not, it still feels like I’m lifting a tank._

“We’re almost there, Gull,” the Hunter’s Ghost told him while he took another slow, deliberate, agonising step forward. “-And those gunships are going to have to reload soon. Maybe you can make a break for it when they do.”

“I _really_ hope you’re right on that, cause I’m not sure how much longer I can hold this thing.” Gull groaned as another couple of missiles struck the shield directly. “You should make a break for the door. You’ll be safer there.”

“No, we can make it. I’m sure of it.”

“Thanks for having some confidence in me, I guess.”

“Hey, I wouldn’t mind going in his place if he doesn’t want to.” Copperhead added, hovering a couple inches from Gull’s face as the two Guardians crammed closer together under the heavy shield as the oncoming fire became more concentrated.

“By all means, no one’s stopping you.” The Gunslinger chimed, but as soon as the Ghost tried to fly towards the opening, Beta’s hand shot out to grab him.

“Imma stop you right there.” Under what little cover he could get under that shield, Beta pulled Copperhead to his chest. “BFF’s die together!”

“I freakin’ hate you.” Copperhead deadpanned, his voice muffled by the Titan’s arms clutching on to the robot for dear life.

“Gull, it’s Mira,” The Warlock’s voice just barely reached his ears over the thunder of rockets around them. “I’m at the door controls on the other side. I’ve got access to the door controls. Standing by to lock it behind you once you’re through.”

“Copy that.” A loud, repetitive beeping sound reached the Gunslinger’s ears then. As he looked about to find its source, his eyes were drawn to the shield he was hiding under and a couple of lights on it that flashed in time with the beeping. “We’ll be through shortly.” He told the Warlock before quickly cutting communications. “Ghost, what’s that?”

“That would be the shield’s low durability alert.” His Ghost told him with some hesitance.

“Meaning?”

“The shield can’t take much more and will buckle in a few seconds.”

Taking a sharp inhale through his nose to allow additional oxygen to reach his brain, Gull reminisced on all the times that his life as a Guardian has been truly and undeniably unfair to him – this instance being no exception. The Hunter didn’t spend more than a few seconds on the memories of past miseries, however, as he quickly turned to look at the Titan next to him. “Beta, we’re going to have to run for it.” He announced loudly to be heard over the comm. link. “If we toss the shield their way, it might buy us a couple of seconds as we sprint for the door.”

“What was that?” Beta replied, shouting just as loudly. “I didn’t catch the first part. It’s too noisy here!”

“Just push up on the shield when I say so.” Gull shouted with an eye-roll, satisfied by the nod Beta gave him while the two Guardians repositioned themselves to get a better angle to heave the shield skyward.

“You might want to hurry up on that.” Gull’s Ghost reminded him as the Hunter gave a grunt of exertion when a couple of impacts to the shield threatened to crush the two Guardians.

“You think?” Gull asked rhetorically before turning his attention back to Beta. “Alright, on three: one…two – three!” he suddenly shouted, using his shoulder muscles to push up on the shield. At first, the shield seemed to weigh several tonnes as the Hunter pushed with all the strength in his fatigued muscles, managing to get it up far enough that he could stand.

Then Beta started pushing.

It was as if the shield weighed nothing for a split-second before it was sent flying through the air. Gull spared the shield a glance as it tumbled through the air; catching a few smart-rockets in its flight before – to Gull’s utter shock – it managed to clip the wings of one of the Cabal Harvesters. The gunship careened to one side for a brief moment, but it was enough to take off a fraction of the fire on the two Guardians.

“Move, Beta!” He shouted over his shoulder to remind the Titan of how dire their situation really was, and that speed was literally key to survival. Reflexively, the Hunter’s legs worked into a sprint in under a second as a barrage of missiles continued to rain around them, a few of the closer explosions causing him to stumble right as he managed to roll through the opening in the doors.

Beta followed immediately after, diving through the opening headfirst and hitting the ground with his chest. “Now! Close it now!” Copperhead yelled over the frequency, spurring Mira into action. The Warlock’s fingers danced across the console before, a few seconds later, the massive doors began to slide close as rockets continued to rain down on them – some managing to slip through the opening, but missing the Guardians as they took cover.

A few of the loudest seconds in Gull’s recent memory passed before the heavy doors finally slammed shut with a resounding boom and the cacophony of rockets was muffled by the thick metal alloy. The Hunter managed a sigh of relief as he stood back up, stumbling once as the pain all over his body finally set in. _Dammit,_ he thought while giving himself a once-over, noticing all the scorch marks and large dents in his armour, along with the holes in his cloak. _–And I just had this cleaned._

His Ghost seemed to share his sentiment as it appeared over his shoulder. “Yeesh. I get that you want to look tougher, but battle-worn is not a good look for you.” It commented.

“Yeah, yeah. We’re all having a laugh at my expense.” He dismissed with an annoyed huff. “Can you fix it?”

A ray of light shone out of the Ghost’s eye onto Gull’s form, bathing his armour in replenishing light and repairing the damage as it made three rotations around him. “You’re lucky the damage is mostly external – and cosmetic. I’ll do what I can, but you should have it sent for maintenance when we get back to the Tower.”

“You mean ‘if’ we get back to the Tower.” He reminded the Ghost before marching over to Mira, who was still at the door terminal fiddling with various digital access points. “We could’ve died out there.” He spoke loudly despite only being a few feet from the Warlock, wanting to convey his anger properly.

“But we didn’t, did we?” she replied in a neutral tone without turning her attention away from the console.

“That’s all you have to say after you almost got us killed because you wanted to play puzzle solver?” Gull growled while forcefully grabbing Mira by the shoulder and turning her to face him.

The Warlock was quick to slap the hand off her shoulder as she spun to jab a finger at the air in front of Gull’s face. “Get off my case, Monarchist.” She snapped back at him. “We wouldn’t _be_ here if you had followed my lead up there and performed long-range reconnaissance like I wanted to!”

“You’re blaming me for this?! How about you and the FWC going behind the Vanguard’s back and not telling them that a damn Cabal armada was assembling above Mars?” Gull shouted back. “You saying that’s not on you?”

“I don’t have time for this,” the Awoken Warlock growled with newly clenched fists. “-Either you drop the attitude, or I drop you.”

“You wanna go right now? Fine – let’s go, you and me!” Gull spat while drawing his knife. “Let’s just make all this easier for the Cabal.”

“Hey, both of you! Can it!” Copperhead shouts in a voice neither Guardian previously thought Ghosts were capable of, causing both of them to turn to the floating pointed shell in surprise. “In case it somehow slipped your tiny brains, we are stranded behind enemy lines with a thousand freaking Cabal soldiers on the other side of that door ready to grind us into space dust. Me and Beta are sticking our necks out for you guys just by being here, and here you two go wasting precious time having a hissy fit at one another! You two are supposed to be Guardians! Why can’t you people ever just work together for once and not rip the Light out of each other over _everything_!” If a Ghost could glower, Gull was sure Copperhead would be glowering in both their faces right now. A few seconds passed by in near-silence as Copperhead seemed to finally register his own words, freezing awkwardly in front of the two stunned Guardians before letting out a tired sigh. “Look, I’m getting side-tracked – point is, this is the absolute worst time to be fighting, you _both_ suck for dragging us into this, and all grudge matches should be settled in the Crucible.”

For a moment, Gull was at a loss for words. His mouth opened and closed futilely as the shock of being told off by a _Ghost_ of all things settled in. He quickly glanced over at Mira to see that the Warlock was in a similar stunned silence, though she somehow managed to appear unshaken by the sudden outburst.

Gull still noticed it, however, as it showed in the subtlest ways – like how her fingers twitched irregularly and how she kept shifting her balance from one foot to the other nervously.

When the Hunter’s eyes found Beta’s, the Exo just looked back at him blankly – and nervously – for a couple of seconds before saying, “Uh, yeah. What he said.”

“Uh…” Gull tried to think of something to say in response to that, but nothing short of a reluctant apology to the Warlock – which he was _absolutely not_ going to say – came to mind.

The bronze-coloured Ghost let out another sigh, its eye shut for a moment in contemplation. “Look, can we just, y’know, get on with the plan?” a pause. “Do we have a plan?”

“Find their communications station, pray they didn’t jam their own channels and get word home.” Gull summarised. “Hopefully it’ll be enough for The City to prepare for the invasion.”

“What about the plan to, y’know, get home?” When all Gull gave in reply was a hesitant shrug, Copperhead let out a long groan. “Great. Fantastic. Next time you invite us for a suicide mission, don’t!”

“Beta and I.” Mira muttered loud enough for everyone to hear.

“What?” Gull asked while quirking an eyebrow under his helmet.

“You said ‘Me and Beta’ earlier,” the Warlock clarified. “The grammatically correct phrasing is ‘Beta and I’.” Gull couldn’t help but roll his eyes at the absurdity of the comment.

Copperhead seemed to share his sentiment. “Do I look like I give a f-” A thunderous boom suddenly shook the part of the shipyard they were in as what felt like a battering ram had just slammed into the heavy double doors. “f…orget about it. You wanna die here arguing? Fine,” Copperhead’s tone suddenly turned flippant. “-Me and Beta will be going that-a way.”

With a concerned look on his face, Gull made a quick analysis on the large doors before sighing. “Well, if we do, we definitely have some time.”

“How much time?” Mira asked, her tone suggesting an inclination to cooperate now.

“Half an hour – maybe.” Gull thought back to past memories and experiences. “An hour tops. Best guess is they just brought down a Goliath tank and tried to blast it open. They’ll give it a couple more tries and if that doesn’t work they’re going to call for one of those big drilling lasers they use to carve tunnels in the sides of mountains.” He shrugged nonchalantly. “All a matter of how long before they realise how tough their doors are.”

“Then we better get moving.” Mira added. “I…managed to download the schematics for the facility. If we’re still going with the original plan, I can lead us there.”

Gull thought to himself for a few moments before conceding to play along for now. Stepping to one side, he held his left arm out. “Lead the way, then.” Gull said in what he hoped was a neutral tone.

As Mira took to the front at a strut, Gull’s Ghost appeared by his shoulder and turned to him. “Now _that_ was inspiring.”

“Yeah, yeah. I can cooperate with others when I have to. No need to throw a sarcasm party.” Gull said with an annoyed eye-roll.

“Not you. Copperhead.” The Ghost corrected. “Never heard a Ghost tell off a Guardian like that before and I have to say, I’m quite amused.”

“Oh sure, go ahead and laugh at my expense.” Gull muttered irritably. “That Ghost better not be a bad influence on you, or I’m keeping you away while he’s around.”

“Please,” the Ghost replied with an eye roll. “-As if I’d imitate the habits of the likes of _him_.”

“I heard that!” Copperhead hollered from up ahead. The Guardian and his Ghost shared a look before they rushed down the hallway to join the others.

 


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With their only option to push on into the belly of the beast, the three Guardians must find a way to send a warning home - or die trying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: I was considering keeping this on hold for an extra day, but I got bored - and antsy. Looking at it, though, I could've spread this one chapter out over another two chapters if I wanted, but I'm trying to keep the chapter count on this fic to the goal I set starting this out. Hopefully I'll be able to meet it.

**Shipbase Metus, Deimos, in orbit around Mars…**

The main corridor leading into the Cabal Shipyard felt more like a tunnel because of its sheer size. Thick pipes ran along the walls of the corridor that led into the ground and ceiling at various points along the corridor, while air vents on the ceiling constantly breathed out dense clouds of steam. Small orange lights all along the roof and walls provided adequate lighting for the three Guardians as they made their way deeper into the Cabal base.

It was a full twenty minutes of carefully advancing through the base before the Guardians found themselves at a divergence in the path: where the corridor ended, there was a Cabal-sized door in their way while to the right, the corridor continued at an upward slope, seeming to take a sharp left only a few metres ahead.

“This way.” Mira pointed in the direction of the slope to their right as her Ghost projected a hologram of the shipyard’s blueprints before her. “We’ll need to get to the base’s control hub before getting into the comms. station. Going this way would lead us down into the assembly line and…well, even if we _were_ supposed to go there, I’d really advise against it.”

“Why?” Beta asked.

“It’s a maze down there.” The Warlock explained. “It’s bad enough that the construction and assembly levels are stacked atop one another, but they needed to leave a massive opening right down the centre for ships going in and out.”

“Meaning?” Gull followed up.

“Meaning that the corridors down there wind around and around.” She pointed at the schematics floating above her hand. “Says here the quickest path to the bottom of the building sector is still a three kilometre walk.”

“So it’s like a rat maze, but without cheese.” Beta determined, one of his metal hands rubbing his chin thoughtfully.

“In certain ways, yes, I suppose.” Mira forced out after a second of hesitation, unsure whether or not the statement demanded that she justify it with acknowledgement.

Beta continued to mutter something about whether or not the Cabal might have cheese at the base as Mira and Gull advanced up the stairwell. “We’ve gotten quite far and still haven’t encountered any resistance.” The Hunter whispered, his voice just loud enough for Mira to hear.

“We did kill quite a few units outside.” Mira pointed out. “Perhaps they’ve run out of guards to spare on slowing us down.” She hummed thoughtfully for a moment. “No, that can’t be it. The rest are likely posted at different critical stations throughout the shipyard.”

“And how critical would you say this ‘control hub’ is?” Gull asked bluntly.

“Very.” The Warlock assured. “From it, we can gain access to the base’s various control stations; communications, engineering, defences…all of it.”

“So we can expect heavy resistance?” Mira nodded in response to the Hunter, but from the way he did not even bother to look at her, she concluded that the question was probably rhetorical. “Great,” Gull droned. He breathed out a sigh of resignation just as another question came to mind. “-So who’s in charge of this place? Did you get anything about a commander or foreman or whatever term the Cabal want to use this time from that console?”

“Let me see.” Mira said while her Ghost hovered over her open palm, projecting lines of information in front of her small enough that only the Warlock could see it clearly. Eventually, it seemed like she found what she was looking for as her hand snapped close and her Ghost disappeared. “Ok, according to the terminal, it seems this place – Shipbase Metus – is run by a Cabal Centurion: Bracus R’Marh.” Mira recited from memory. “The recent logs on the terminal seem to indicate he’s still on-site, and if that’s so, he’s probably waiting for us in the control hub.”

“He got a retinue of bodyguards with him?” Gull asked as they reached the top of the stairwell, arriving at the middle of a corridor that led to a door on either end.

“Probably.” Mira replied as she pointed down the corridor that led to the control hub before taking point.

“Well I suppose that’s what the flaming pistol’s for.” Gull muttered as the three Guardians barely made it seven paces down the hallway before the doors on the other end gave a hiss as they opened, allowing two Phalanxes to walk out with their shields at the ready and their guns already firing.

As another rank of Psions filed out behind the Phalanxes, the three Guardians wasted no time in choosing which side of the corridor they wanted to be on and flattening themselves against it. The protrusions and grooves in the walls provided some manner of cover for Mira, but only if she kept herself firmly pressed against it, which did not leave much room for firing back at the Cabal.

She allowed the Cabal a chance to fire on them without attempting to retaliate, watching the micro-rockets zip down the hallway as she assessed their chances and thought up the best course of action. Looking to the others, she saw that the Gunslinger was trying to fight back, taking pot shots from out of his shallow cover to little effect. The Striker was not faring any better; his bulky armour making it difficult for him to take cover as he tried to reposition himself every time he was hit – which Mira found funny in a sadistic sort of way, knowing that the rockets that glanced off the Titans armour did not hurt him as much as they would her.

After a few seconds, the onslaught of rockets coming their way died down slightly, indicating that the Cabal soldiers’ weapons had overheated from the constant firing. Mira was about to take advantage of the moment by popping out of cover to assess the strength of their enemies, but the Hunter beat her to it.

“Beta, charge!” he yelled, causing the Exo to spur into action. Armed with his shotgun, Beta sprinted straight into the Cabal forces down the hall.

“No, wait!” Mira’s warning came too late. As he got within a metre of the enemy line – shotgun firing uselessly, one of the Phalanxes lashed out with his shield, sending Beta flying before smacking into the far wall.

At that moment, however, Gull suddenly sprung from cover and fired a burst of rounds at the exposed Phalanx, each round hitting their mark and taking off the Phalanx’s head. Mira realised the opportunity Gull had created a split-second later and joined him in firing at the now-vulnerable Psions that had been hiding behind the large shield.

She threw a grenade towards the remaining Phalanx for good measure, but it did not take more than a few seconds to finish off the enemies in their way. The Phalanx was the last to fall, needing the combined firepower and mobility of both Guardians to flank it and bring it down.

When the hallway fell silent once more, Mira took a few seconds to inspect the corpses they had left while reloading her weapons. Once she was sure they were all dead, the Warlock turned her attention to Gull. “You used Beta to break their guard and create an opening.” She stated in an accusing tone.

The Gunslinger simply shrugged. “Maybe I did – we’ll never know.” He defended adamantly before adding, “I knew he could take it.”

In response, the Awoken gave an amused huff. “Good move, but not one I’d expect from someone affiliated with New Monarchy.”

“What, the FWC got a monopoly on crazy, suicidal combat strategies all of a sudden?” Gull asked, his posture giving off the impression he was trying to seem vexed, but his sarcastic tone told Mira otherwise.

“You threw us at the Cabal as bait?!” they both heard Copperhead yell as Beta picked himself off the ground, leveraging himself with both his arms like a pair of pistons. “That is such a-”

“Awesome idea!” Beta finished for his Ghost as he hopped to his feet. “I was all like ‘Yeah!’, and they were all like ‘Raaargh’. And then I ran up and shotgunned that guy and he was all like ‘Woosh’ and then I was all like ‘Bang. Wall-slamming sound!’ Ah, great times.”

“See? Fine.” Gull gave the Titan a friendly pat on the shoulder as he passed him, making his way to the end of the corridor. Stepping over the Psions he had shot down, the Hunter stopped as he came up to the door at the end of the hallway. “Looks like they remembered to shut the door behind them.”

Mira approached the Gunslinger’s side with her Ghost out, getting closer to the small panel fixed into the centre of the door. “Yes, but it seems they forgot to lock it this time.” The Warlock’s hands hovered over the panel briefly before pulling back. “We should devise a strategy before advancing. The Bracus is undoubtedly on the other side of this door, but we have no idea how many guards are in there with him.” Turning so that her back faced the door, Mira hummed as she ran idea after idea through her mind. “Our approach options are severely limited, and until we see what the interior of the hub looks like, we won’t know what our options for cover will be.”

“Oh, for the love of- move!” Gull growled impatiently as he roughly shoved Mira to one side, his free hand smacking into the door controls to get them to open while a flaming hand cannon appeared out of thin air in his other hand. As soon as the doors slid open, Gull took aim on the biggest target in the room – who also happened to be standing in the centre of the room on a platform – and fired all three shots into it. The large Centurion barely had time to react as the first two shots melted through his shield and armour, before the third incinerated him completely.

As the Centurion collapsed to the ground in a heap of ash, Gull dashed to one side in order to take cover behind the doorframe as the remaining Cabal soldiers in the other room returned fire, just as his Golden Gun fizzled out.

Mira followed Gull’s action, dashing to the other end of the doorframe, as she first attempted to peek around the edge of her cover. The Warlock immediately decided against it, however, as a shot from the other side glanced off the doorframe inches from her face, and she instead turned to glare at the Hunter with reprimands about alerting their enemy on the tip of her tongue.

“There are eight Legionnaires in there – four on either side of the room.” Gull began before Mira had a chance to say anything. “Three Psions near the back, but it looks like they’re withdrawing. Two more Centurions on that command platform in the centre too, so take your pick ‘cause there’s plenty to go around.”

Under her helmet, the Awoken’s eyes narrowed in a leer as she bit back an irritated growl while considering her options based on what the Hunter told her. _It won’t do to start another argument,_ She reminded herself. _I’ll have plenty of things to say to him once we’re out of this._ “I will take the ones on the right.”

“I’ll go left, then.” Gull replied before turning to look over his shoulder. “Beta, do you think you can-”

“Rush!” Beta yelled before charging straight through the door, taking whatever hits pinged off his armour as he sprinted straight for the command platform.

“Go!” Mira yelled before popping out of cover, taking aim and firing on the closest Legionary she could see.

* * *

While the two Guardians by the door picked off the Cabal soldiers one by one, Beta leapt straight for the command platform with his shotgun in hand. The Titan landed right in front of a Centurion as he brought the weapon up and fired a direct shot into the creature’s waist. The Centurion stumbled back from the force of the shot, giving Beta the time he needed to first smack the gun out of the Centurion’s hand with the butt of his shotgun before delivering an Arc-charged uppercut to its chin.

The attack took the Cabal soldier’s head off, leaving its body teetering on its feet for a couple of seconds before toppling backwards in a heap.

Before the Exo had time to make a one-liner, however, the remaining Cabal Centurion quickly stepped in and delivered a powerful punch that threw Beta off his feet. When Beta landed, it was on one of the consoles on the command platform, and the force behind the impact was enough to leave an outline of his form on the console.

As Beta peeled himself off the console, he dropped to the floor on one knee before looking across at the Centurion. “Round one: Space Turtle.” He said in his best commentator voice. Almost as if in response, the Cabal commander let out a low growl and bashed its gun against its chest-plate, challenging Beta.

“You may have a bigger gun, but I’ve got a- surprise grenade!” he shouted while flinging out a flashbang grenade at the Centurion. The grenade detonated a second after bouncing off the Centurion’s chest; the explosion stunning the alien commander with a flash of light. Taking full advantage of the opportunity, Beta charged straight for the Centurion, stopping just a couple feet from him as he raised one leg and struck out with it. “Falcon Kick!” The bottom of his armoured boot met its mark and a second later, the Cabal Centurion was on his back. With a small hop, the Titan mounted the downed Centurion as he brought his shotgun out and aimed for the head. Two shots later, it was all over.

“Again; that is _not_ what we are calling that technique!” Copperhead began as soon as they were sure that the Cabal Centurion was dead.

“You’re just jealous that I thought of it first.”

“I am not-”

“Uh, can you two do this later?” Mira’s Ghost interrupted, patching itself into the communications feed. “You’ve still got- watch out!”

Beta moved without thinking when he heard the Ghost’s warning, diving out of the way just in time as a wave of psionic energy surged up the other end of the platform. Popping back out of cover, Beta returned fire blindly at the two Psions that had tried to hit him, only managing to clip one of them in the ankle as they sprinted through the open door in front of them before shutting it as soon as they were through.

“Did I get ‘em?” Beta asked anyone around to hear him, his eyes still shut as he pulled the trigger on his auto rifle a couple more times to confirm that the clip was empty.

His Ghost gave an exasperated sigh as it materialised a little to his right. “What did I tell you about firing with your eyes closed?”

“That if I’m gonna do it, I better kill something?” Beta asked hesitantly, as if he wasn’t sure of the answer.

“Exactly, and look what you did! You didn’t kill either of them!” The Exo opened one eye to look at the Ghost, his facial features crinkly up as it continued to scold him. “You let ‘em both get away, knowing they went toe-to-toe with a Titan and lived to tell the tale.”

“Sorry,” Beta’s voice dipped into a lower synthetic octave to convey his sadness, with Copperhead only able to sigh and roll its eye as a way to show he would take Beta’s apology into consideration.

“Left side’s clear!” Gull called out as he moved along the wall in a sweep, his rifle in his hands as he checked behind terminals and platforms on his side of the room for anything.

“Right side’s clear!” Mira parroted, though the Warlock chose to stow her weapon as she slowly walked over to console that was roughly two metres long. Gingerly putting her hand to it, the console reactivated and projected a three-dimensional hologram in front of her.

Once Gull had made a circuit around the left side of the room, he slapped his pulse rifle to his back, falling into step beside Beta as they approached Mira. “Found something?”

“Maybe,” The Awoken mused. “-It’s an access point for the local Cabal network. Seems like it should give me direct access to the station’s long-range transmitters.”

“Can you send a call home from here?” Gull asked, his voice hopeful. “Maybe bounce it off one of the active Lunar outposts?”

Mira looked like she was about to respond, but suddenly turned to face the console as a large red message appeared in front of the holographic display. Reaching up to remove her helmet, she placed it on the console before turning away from it and dancing over to the central command platform, a frown firmly etched into her features.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” Gull continued, his body posture suggesting he was on-edge by Mira’s response – or lack thereof, in this case.

“It seems the Bracus had enough sense in him to shut off remote access to all facilities from the control hub. We’ll have to run a bypass if we want to phone home.” The Sunsinger explained.

“Ok, and how long will that take?” Gull asked again as his right foot began to tap impatiently.

“Twenty seconds – give or take ten seconds?” Mira guessed as her Ghost materialised in her empty hand. “Ghost, try a simultaneous authentication from there – let me know when you come across a set of access codes.” She offered while pointing to a neighbouring terminal while she worked at the main access console.

“Anything we little, unenlightened people can do?” Copperhead asked, his words dripping with sarcasm.

“Yes, actually, I need someone on that console over there.” She instructed while pointing to the long terminal the Warlock had just been working at. “When I say so, try sending out a hail to this encrypted channel.” Mira then began to recite the specific codes for the frequency she had in mind.

“I’m on it.” Gull called out as he sauntered over to the console, pulling back his hood and taking off his helmet as he went. Taking a deep breath of fresh air, his hands hovering over the controls as he stopped in front of the console, waiting for Mira’s signal. “Never heard of that encryption before, who’s it for?”

“It’s one of Ikora Rey’s backup channels that she uses to communicate with her Hidden.” Mira explained. “I made a bargain with one of her agents to share it with me, in case I might ever need it.”

“Right, but why are we using an old Hidden frequency? If we were trying to warn Earth, wouldn’t it make more sense to try the Vanguard channels? Y’know, to make sure someone’s listening?”

“It would, yes.” The Warlock agreed, multitasking as she split her attention between talking to Gull, communicating with her Ghost through hand signals and open windows, and running a bypass on the command console. “In theory, at least. We have no way of knowing if the Cabal can retrace the signal once we’re done here, or even if they’re listening now. If they could trace the signal back to The Last City, they may decide to start the invasion early, leaving The City with no time to prepare. And even if they didn’t, probably best not to give them the official Vanguard frequencies so they can just eavesdrop on everything that goes through the Tower.”

“…Good point, don’t know why I didn’t think of it.” Gull mused as he hit a button with his open palm. “Ok, standing by.”

“Just a few more…seconds,” Mira’s hands continued to dance across the terminal in front of her before she jabbed at a light that just came on, causing the screens in front of her flashed yellow. “-Yes! Try it now!” She called out.

His hands poised over the controls, Gull quickly went to work the second Mira’s command left her lips. He keyed in the encrypted frequency in a flash, and began broadcasting in no time at all. A few seconds passed by in silence as the communications equipment continued to ping a hail while waiting for any response to come through.

A thought momentarily came to Copperhead as he mentally cross-referenced the frequency Mira mentioned with others he knew of. It occurred to him then that the frequency they were using was an old one – one that, if records were to be trusted, has not been used since the Battle at Twilight Gap. Worry briefly passed through the Ghost’s mind, as he ran some of the worst-case scenarios through his mind. That the frequency was obsolete and no one would be listening. That someone _would_ be listening, but immediately recognise the hail to be from a Cabal transmitter. That a long-range signal jammer the Cabal fleet might have deployed would block the signal.

Fortunately, this worry passed when Gull spoke up in an ecstatic tone. “I’ve got something. We’re getting a transmission back over the channel.”

“Patch it through to the command console; I’ll link it to our feeds from here!” Gull and Mira worked in tandem to relay the live transmission and within a few seconds, a familiar voice spoke to them over the comms.

Though, not one Beta or Gull were expecting.

“This is Lakshmi-2 of the Future War Cult. You are on an encrypted channel only known to a handful of individuals, but I do not recognise your telemetry signature. Identify yourself.” The Exo Warlock demanded.

Beta looked like he was about to say something – _Something dumb, probably,_ Copperhead thought to himself – when the Warlock beat him to it. “This is Sunsinger Mira Vuul of the Warlock Order, reporting in on my findings.” She said formally, as if speaking to a superior.

“Lakshmi?” Gull exclaimed in surprise and building annoyance, though only the other occupants of the room had heard him, as he had not yet synchronized his communicator to the additional frequency.

“Warlock Mira,” Lakshmi replied in greeting. “-If this really _is_ you, then this transmission alone cannot bode well.” The female Exo’s tone was grim and foreboding.

“I travelled to Mars, as you had requested, and found something in the planet’s outer orbit, as you had predicted. My findings were, to say the least, unsettling.” Mira began, but as she was about to continue, she stopped to turn at the sound of heavy footsteps behind her.

“No, what’s ‘unsettling’ is that you lied to us.” Gull began with more than a little of bite in his tone. “You said this was one of Ikora Rey’s frequencies, yet here we are talking to…your cult rep!”

The Warlock’s teeth ground together under her lips as she stared down the Hunter. She remained silent for a second before Lakshmi spoke again. “Who is this? I do not recognise your voice.”

“Gunslinger Gull, Hunter Guardian.” He introduced immediately, not turning his glare away from Mira for a second.

On the other end of the line, Lakshmi let out a low-pitch hum for a second before speaking in a monotone voice. “Gull, Gunslinger. Human Hunter. Head of subterranean and orbital reconnaissance on Lunar. Known associate of New Monarchy.”

Gull’s jaw opened slightly as he stared into space, a surprised expression frozen on his face for a couple seconds before he forced his features and voice back to normal. “You know who I am?”

“The Future War Cult keeps tabs on all possible Guardian recruits in The Tower.” The Female Exo stated as if it was a simple fact, though the surprise in both Gull and Mira’s eyes said otherwise.

The Hunter did a good job at not letting his surprise bleed into his words, however. “Well you can cross me off that list, I’m not interested in the FWC – and I’m here on behalf of the Vanguard, not New Monarchy.” He announced while stepping up to the front of the platform as if his voice to carry through better from there. “The Vanguard are onto you, Lakshmi. They know the FWC are hiding things from them, and when I send word to them that you were concealing rumours of a Cabal battle fleet, well, I can imagine the FWC will be a little hard-pressed to find R&D funding from here on out.”

Mira looked, understandably, shocked – and a little bit irked – at Gull’s outright threat towards the Future War Cult representative, but she remained silent as she waited for Lakshmi’s response. A second passed with no other words exchanged, then another. At this point, everyone in the room was waiting expectantly when a response came through. “Hello? Did you say something?”

It took a moment for everyone to register what Lakshmi had just said, a moment that passed by in silence as everyone waited for anyone else to respond and verify that what they had heard was correct. Eventually, Gull finally replied with, “Uh, h-hello?”

“Hello? Guardian, is that you?” Lakshmi continued. “Your signal is heavily distorted. If you can hear me, please respond.”

“Lakshmi, can you hear me?” Mira called out, growling through her teeth when no reply came through after a couple seconds. She thumbed a button on the console in front of her before turning first to Gull, then to Copperhead. “Our signal must be shifting.”

“Shifting?” Gull asked sceptically. “What does that mean?”

“It means we need someone to actively recalibrate the frequency to maintain contact.” Mira elaborated while looking around the control hub for something. She stopped as her head snapped to look at Beta. “There, that’s the terminal to calibrate the signal. Can you…” she trailed off, suddenly looking unsure about the request she was about to make.

“I’ll hold his hand through it.” Copperhead chimed in as he turned to face Beta. “Beta, would you mind helping me out with something?” the Ghost asked while floating over to the console.

“Does it involve bashing walnuts?” the Exo asked while following his Ghost without question.

“Better: you get to turn knobs!”

“Ye- wait, what?” Beta did a double take as he and Copperhead stopped in front of a console. The bronze-coloured Ghost cast a bluish-white light from its eye on the console, causing an interface to flash to life just above it.

“Just grab that circle-thing with your hand and follow my instructions.” The Ghost ordered, which the Titan complied with without question. What followed for the next five seconds was the sound of the Ghost’s voice as it told Beta which direction to turn the knob – Copperhead pausing every now and then to decide which way Beta should tune the signal amplifier before it turned to Mira. “Well? You expect me to guess whether the signal works or not? Try phoning home, ET, and tell me if the signal’s coming through clear!”

The Awoken Warlock bore a brief look of displeasure at the Ghost’s remark, but it fell with a sigh as she stared into space while speaking aloud once more. “Lakshmi, can you hear me?”

“-ira, is that you? Your signal is coming through clearer now.” The Exo’s words carried through with a bit of static first, but gradually cleared up perfectly. “Now, what was it you last said?”

“I was just giving my report on the situation,” Mira spoke before Gull could speak up. “-Which I am more than happy to repeat.” She shot the Hunter a look to let him know that she would be _very_ unhappy if he interrupted her. “I followed a Cabal Interceptor around the far side of Mars’ second moon. The interceptor led me straight to a battle fleet of at least a dozen and a half cruisers, with a carrier as the fleet’s flagship. I’ve already gone through several scenarios in my mind as to the reason behind the fleet’s existence, but I’m afraid the evidence for the obvious is…overwhelming.”

“An invasion fleet.” Lakshmi’s tone was grim with acceptance, enough so that even Copperhead shivered at the thought.

“Yes, ma’am.” Mira continued, looking down for a moment to consider what she was about to say before looking back up as if staring right at the Exo. “How soon can the Future War Cult be prepared to go to war?”

“The Future War Cult is _always_ ready for war, though we will need time to reallocate resources and recall the other field agents.” Lakshmi’s answer came through without hesitance, but it was enough to give Mira some pause. A pause that lasted long enough for Gull to get a word in.

“This isn’t about the FWC anymore!” he yelled, suddenly commanding the attention in the room. “ _If_ the Cabal really are planning to go to war, we need the effort of the _entire_ city to even stand a chance. Now, you can go make sure your red, blue and yellow fanatics are ready to stand their ground, but as soon as this conversation is over, I’m going straight to the Vanguard – and I’m going to tell them how you withheld information about a Cabal threat that we could have been preparing for, together!”

“Gull, that’s enou-”

“There is no need for such action, Gunslinger.” Lakshmi interrupted before Mira could continue. “If what you say is true, then I will go to the Vanguard and tell them everything myself. I shall deal with the consequences of my decision – whatever they may be.”

Gull looked like he wanted to say something else, but his mouth only opened and closed as he glanced between the two other Guardians in the room. From over his shoulder, his Ghost blinked its eye at him once before turning to address the Warlock. “Well, didn’t see that one coming. But I suppose that resolves that, all the same.”

“One thing still does not make sense,” Lakshmi continued. “Knowing what you do, why did you not return to The Tower to give your report? And why does my telemetry register this as a Cabal frequency?”

“When we tried making the jump back to Earth, our warp drives weren’t able to generate the necessary pull on space.” Mira started before nodding to her Ghost to continue the explanation.

“The Cabal carrier seems to be equipped with a quantum relative-space gravity well.” It said while projecting a holographic image of the device for everyone to see. “It’s got everything within its field of range tapped in a bubble that prevents faster-than-light travel. Can’t fault us for trying, though.”

“Since we were unable to return to Earth, our next decision was to land on Deimos itself, storm the Cabal shipyard on its surface and find the controls to broadcast a message strong enough to reach Earth – which we did.” Mira continued.

“Albeit withholding a few details.” Gull added bitterly, which Mira did an excellent job of ignoring.

“And as far as these bozos have told me, that’s literally as far as the plan goes. We have _zero_ idea of how to get off this rock, and are most likely gonna get captured, tortured, and executed – and don’t even get me started on what they’re going to do to the Guardians.” Though Beta wasn’t sure how he did it, the look Copperhead sent Mira was undoubtedly a glare. “Or was that part of the plan, too?”

“Another Guardian?” Lakshmi asked, having not heard Copperhead’s voice this entire time. “Warlock Mira, exactly how many others are there with you at this moment?”

“That was Copperhead, the Ghost of Titan Beta Tauri-1337.” The blue-haired Awoken introduced with a sigh. “He and Gull are the only ones here with me.”

“Hello!” Beta chimed in greeting, waving a hand in the air. “Mysterious voice in the ceiling.”

“I understand that this mission was supposed to be carried out discreetly, but drawing their attention was…unavoidable.” If Mira’s discomfited tone didn’t convey the shame she was feeling, then the way she hung her head and let out a resigned sigh did. “This mistake is mine alone.”

“Perhaps,” Lakshmi’s neutral voice brought a flash of hope and curiosity to Mira’s eyes as she looked to her Ghost as if the answers were written on its shell.

“Hey guys, you might want to speed up this call,” Copperhead called out in warning. “-Seems like the Cabal have picked up on what we’re doing and’ve started scrambling our signal. I think I can keep this line going for maybe another half-minute, but that’s it.”

 “Warlock Mira, can you pull the details on the strength of the Cabal fleet from where you are?” The female Exo’s words came out in a rush, now wary of the time constraint.

“There should be a manifest somewhere, but there’s no time to transfer it over.” Mira replied just as fast.

“And we can’t leave while the Cabal have us trapped here.” Gull’s Ghost added.

“You’ll just have to make sure The City is ready for anything while we keep the Cabal busy for as long as possible.” Mira offered grimly.

“There may be a way to deal with the Cabal: I’m sending a data package your way now Mira. It contains a set of remote access codes.”

Mira’s hands and eyes darted down to the terminal interface just as it received a compressed data-file from the other end of the line. “Ghost, pull the files from the console and erase any trace of it on the Cabal network.” She ordered before turning her attention back to Lakshmi’s invisible form. “Remote access codes for what?”

“A long-thought inactive defensive array on Mars’ surface.” The Exo explained. “Like on Earth, strongholds and capital cities were once protected by a complex network of defence systems controlled by the War-”

“For The Traveller’s sake, we only have like twenty seconds before we lose signal – skip to the important part!” Gull demanded, his agitation clear now as the Human began pacing around one of the consoles near the wall while his Ghost did what it could to support the communication line.

“Yes, of course. The codes will allow you to access the surface-to-orbit anti-matter cannons on Mars, at least, whichever ones our field operatives were able to bring back online.” Lakshmi continued. “If luck is on your side, your carrier might be within firing range of one of the cannons. Be warned: most of the cannons will only be able to fire a single shot, and while it should be enough to penetrate the shielding and hull of a Cabal warship, it’s still best that you don’t miss.” Towards the end of her sentence, the Exo’s voice gradually became more distorted with static.

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Mira replied with a nod when her Ghost indicated it had received the codes. “We’re losing you, Lakshmi – the signal might only hold up for another five seconds. So…thank you.”

Copperhead was surprised to hear genuine gratitude in the Awoken Warlock’s voice, but he reasoned that it was hardly the most unusual or surprising thing that had happened in the past forty-eight hours. “Return to us safely, Warlock Mira. The Future War Cult will have need of you in our…” her last few words were lost as the background static became deafening, like the downpour of heavy rain.

Cutting the telemetry feed as soon as Lakshmi cut out, Mira turned to her Ghost with renewed determination in her eyes. “Ghost?”

“I got it,” the Ghost replied. “-But we have a couple problems.”

“Well we’re not getting any younger, so out with it.” Gull growled impatiently.

“We’re not getting any older, either though.” Beta pointed out, which got a reaction out of Gull in the form of a sigh and roll of the eyes.

“Well, the first problem shouldn’t be that hard to solve: our local signal transmitters aren’t powerful enough to reach those cannons on Mars, so we’ll need a stronger transmitter.” The Ghost nodded its head towards the terminal in front of Mira as he explained to indicate what he had in mind. “We might have to get a little creative with the second problem, though: I cross-checked the location of the active cannon emplacements and their firing range with our real-time atlas of Mars, and the carrier’s not in range of any of them.”

“Well, luring the carrier in range is probably out of the question – we’d get shot down before we’d even leave Deimos’ lower orbit.” Copperhead mused while floating from Beta’s side to the command platform. “But what if…is Deimos in the firing range of any of the cannons?” the bronze-shelled Ghost asked.

“Hold on, I’ll patch the data into the holo-projector.” Mira’s Ghost informed everyone as it began interfacing with the console in front of it. A couple seconds passed in silence before a set of projection prisms in the ceiling lit up and formed a hologram of Mars over the command platform. Along it, several points on the red planet were marked small, green triangles. “Yes, it seems like that one, cannon twenty-six B, might be in range of Deimos.”

“ _Might be_?” Gull asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Well…we’re a little out of range of the cannon at the moment, but based on what we know of Deimos’ thirty hour orbit of Mars, we might just pass through the edge of that cannon’s firing solution in the next fifteen or so minutes.” The Ghost explained hesitantly. “Most of this is only estimation, though.” It then turned its attention to Copperhead. “Why do you want to know if we’re in range of the ca-”

Before the Ghost got a chance to finish its question, the doors to the control hub slid apart and a squad of Cabal Legionaries marched in guns blazing. Gull reacted immediately – firing back as soon as the first shot was fired, but it took a second for the other two Guardians to spring into action.

Under their combined firepower, the squad of five shock-troopers fell in a matter of seconds. “Looks like the Cabal’ve found a way in.” Gull muttered while reloading his rifle. “Mira!” he called out, drawing the attention – and ire – of the Warlock. “It’s not gonna be long before this place is swarming with Cabal, so you and the Ghosts do whatever it takes to get us out of here!”

The Warlock held his gaze for a few seconds longer than necessary before giving a curt nod. “Right, keep your comms. open for updates.”

Giving a nod in reply, Gull grabbed his helmet and slipped it on before turning to look at Beta. “C’mon, Beta. Let’s go roll out the welcome mat.”


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The situation grows more desperate as the Guardians fight on multiple fronts to turn the Cabal's weapons against them and lay a trap that will either allow them to go home, or get killed.

**Shipbase Metus, Deimos, in orbit around Mars…**

“You want to do _what_?” The Sunsinger’s Ghost cried in disbelief.

“Lure the Cabal carrier towards the shipyard.” Copperhead repeated. “Given its current position, if we lure it towards us, we might be able to get it close enough to us as we enter that anti-matter cannon’s firing range. It’ll give us the shot we need to hit that gravity well and get out of here.”

“You do realise that the only way we're drawing in that carrier is if things get so bad down here that they want to drop an orbital bombardment on us, right?!” the Ghost argued.

"It's the Cabal; there's always a risk of orbital bombardment." The bronze Ghost snapped back. "We just have to make sure we hit them first before they hit us."

“It could work.” Mira mused, shooting her Ghost a wide-eyed look. “It’s our best chance of taking down the carrier’s gravity well and getting back to The Tower.”

“I can’t believe you’re agreeing to this!” her Ghost exclaimed, the disbelief clear in its eye. “We’re barely holding up against the Cabal here as it is. How are we going to take on an entire carrier’s worth of them – let alone a fleet? And that’s assuming they don’t blow us up immediately.”

“The City is counting on us to get these fleet specs to them.” Mira reasoned while waving the data-disk in her hand around. “Otherwise we won't be able to hold up against the invasion!”

The Ghost gained a thoughtful look as it turned its gaze away for a second before snapping its attention to Copperhead. “Even if we wanted to, how exactly would we lure the Cabal carrier towards the moon?”

“I’ve got an idea for that. It’s a long shot, but at the moment it seems like our only shot.” Copperhead spoke up as it flew to one of the consoles near the wall and began interfacing with it. “This shipyard is outfitted with an array of automatic heavy artillery cannons used to shoot down enemy aircraft – that’s what we felt coming in, pretty standard issue for most Cabal bases. If one of us hacked the defence network they’re all linked to, it looks possible to reprogram the guns to fire at Cabal ships instead.” The Ghost turned back to stare at his dark-blue counterpart and it’s Guardian. “I figure if we make enough of a ruckus, the Cabal’ll eventually decide that the shipyard’s a lost cause. When that happens, they’re gonna call in the biggest gun they’ve got to knock us down.”

“The carrier.” Mira breathed out in understanding.

“Bingo,” Copperhead chimed. “-Once it gets close enough, well, we’ll just have to take our best shot at it and hope for the best. Otherwise…” the bronze shell shuddered in fear of the outcome if they were to take the risk and find themselves on the short end of the metaphorical stick.

Mira shared some of the fear she knows the Ghost must be feeling, though she did a better job at hiding it. That fear came from the growing realisation that they might not be able to walk away from this, especially with their current odds. True, the Awoken Guardian had been prepared to give her life for the mission as soon as she set foot on Deimos, but with that final death so close now that she could almost see it, Mira was beginning to realise how unprepared she was to actually face it.

“That’s it? That’s the plan? _Take our best shot at it and hope for the best_?” Mira’s Ghost exclaimed hysterically, absolutely baffled by how _this_ was their best chance of survival.

“Hey, it’s better than holing up here waiting to die – helpless while the Cabal get ready to invade Earth!” Copperhead argued.

“I hate to agree with him – I really do,” Mira told her Ghost, looking directly into its eye with a fiery resolution burning behind her violet irises. “-But this is our best chance to get home: strike a massive blow to the Cabal. We’re going for it.”

Narrowing its eye at its Guardian while flicking its gaze back and forth between the Awoken and the other Ghost, Mira’s Ghost let out a sigh while the back of its shell spun. “Fine, I’ll interface with the automated defence systems from here and repurpose the guns to fire at Cabal ship signatures.”

“Already tried that – didn’t work.” Copperhead stated in a matter-of-fact tone. When the Warlock shot it a curious – and displeased – look, he continued while refusing to look Mira directly in the eye. “Control of the automatic guns have been locked by a secondary control room linked to the defence systems. Someone’s gotta go there and hack the turrets from the secondary system.” Glancing up at Mira, Copperhead found she still bore the same, unchanged expression on her face. “Something tells me I should’ve asked first before trying to take over the shipyard’s auto-turrets by myself.”

With a sigh, the Warlock reached a hand up to pinch the bridge of her nose, massaging it gently to relieve some of the tension under the skin. “Where exactly is this secondary control room?”

“Through there.” As she followed the Ghost’s line of sight to the middle door on the far wall of the control hub, a thought crossed her mind that Copperhead seemed to share. “I bet those two Psions that got away had something to do with it.”

Without giving a response, Mira turned away from Copperhead and shared a look with her Ghost. “We should stay here to monitor Cabal activity in and out of the base.”

“Agreed.” Her Ghost concurred. It fell silent for a couple of seconds before offering another idea. “Ask the Hunter?”

“Ask the Hunter.” Mira parroted before thumbing her communicator. “Gull, can you here me?”

* * *

Holding down on the trigger of his machine gun until it clicked dry, Gull ducked back behind his makeshift barricade of Phalanx shields propped against one another before slapping the release bolt on the weapon and tossing the smoking, empty bullet barrel to one side.

“I heard – I’ve been listening in.” he yelled over the comm. while slumping to one knee as the weight of the weapon in his hand and fatigue took hold. The machine gun suddenly disappeared in a flash of light as his pulse rifle took its place. “Give me a moment to secure the hallway and I’ll head to the gun controls.”

“Got it.” Mira replied before Gull cut the telemetry feed in favour of turning his focus to the battle at hand. With a deep breath, the Hunter popped back out of cover and lined his sights up with the first alien helmet he saw.

His fingers moved as they had done so a thousand times before, twitching rapidly against the trigger each time he turned his aim to a new target. The bursts of fire that came from his rifle – though not always fatal – always met their mark.

Admittedly, the task was significantly easier thanks to a certain Exo who was constantly laying down suppressing fire against the Cabal shock-troopers moving against them. To Gull’s left, taking cover behind the dead body of a Centurion resting against the wall, Beta continuously sprayed fire from his auto rifle at the squads of Cabal forces coming their way. The endless shower of bullets – though not effective at lethally wounding the enemies coming their way – forced the Cabal to concentrate fire and angle their shields towards the Titan, leaving them wide open for Gull to strike deadly blows at them through concentrated bursts.

Gull would have thought it to be some ingenious battle tactic that Lord Shaxx probably drilled into every Titan that went through the Crucible.

That is, if it weren’t for Beta’s panicked screams and the way he frantically swung his rifle left and right.

_Maybe that’s how Shaxx trained him to do it_ , Gull didn’t let the thought distract him for too long, quickly returning his attention to the remaining Legionaries still advancing towards them.

With a wild grenade from Beta to blow apart the Legionaries and a thrown knife from Gull to bring down a single fleeing Psion, the last of the Cabal forces were broken. The Gunslinger allowed himself a moment to lower his rifle and take a few deep breaths before turning to Beta. “I’m gonna go hack the base’s turrets, so you’ll have to hold the line here. There’ll be more coming – lot’s more, so stay sharp.”

“My middle name is Sharp!” Beta boasted confidently, swapping out the empty magazine in his rifle without even looking at it. “I mean, how many guys did you get?”

Under his helmet, Gull let a teasing smirk tug at the corners of his mouth as he hefted his rifle onto his shoulder with one hand. “Thirteen.”

“Hah, well I got…uh…” The Exo’s eyes darted around aimlessly. “Copperhead?”

“I didn’t see – I was working back here, remember?” The Ghost called over the communications link, having heard Beta’s shout his name.

“I counted five confirmed final hits for Beta.” Gull’s Ghost added helpfully.

“Five? Yeah, five! Beat tha- oh wait, thirteen is more than five.”

Before Gull turned to leave, he quickly stuck a hand down one of the pockets of his combat trousers and fished out a small, hand-sized rectangular container. With a reluctant sigh, he tossed the metal box to Beta, who caught it after fumbling with it for a couple of seconds. “Here, you might need this: specialised ammo synths.”

Turning the small box over a couple times, Beta eventually found the green button that took the place of one of the box’s corners. As he pressed the button, a side of the box popped open and from it, a dozen shotgun shells came pouring out.

“Aw, yis.” Beta cheered softly to himself. “No one’s getting in our house tonight.”

“Uh, sure.” Gull said in reply before taking off back down the corridor and passing through the door to the control hub. “Better get out there in case, y’know…” he yelled over to Copperhead as he ran pass Mira and the two Ghosts.

“Yeah, you’re probably right.” Copperhead grumbled after giving a disgruntled growl. It turned to Mira then. “I assume you can manage without me?” Immediately, Mira’s face bore an expression of indignation, but was unable to give a reply ahead of the Ghost. “A-ah, don’t answer that! Just make sure you’re ready to pull the trigger when the time comes.”

With that, Copperhead vanished in a flash of light. “There is something going on with that Ghost.” Gull thought out loud after watching the interaction unfold.

Mira’s head immediately snapped towards Gull. “Shipyard defence station. Now!” She demanded with an outstretched hand to indicate which door Gull was supposed to go through.

Somewhat miffed – but mostly amused – that Mira had just barked at him like a teacher at the City would order a misbehaving child to leave the classroom and stand in the halls, the Hunter had to supress a mocking smirk as he took off at a sprint. “On it.”

Coming up to the door, the Hunter slowed to a stop in front of it when he noticed that it did not open automatically at his approach. _Right, the Psions probably locked it from the inside._ Gull ran his free hand along the dense metal alloy, looking for any way to open it. Finding nothing, he sighed before turning around to look for the Warlock. “Mira, they locked the door behind them, do you think you can-”

“Heads up!” That was the only warning Gull got to before a rocket came soaring through the air before exploding when it hit the door. Another followed it almost immediately, by which point the metal alloy of the door twisted and buckled under the intense heat and force – not completely, but enough for a Human to slip through.

Gull had – fortunately – cleared the blast zone before the first rocket hit, and was now breathing heavily from the shock of almost getting struck by a rocket. “What the hell?”

“You asked for my help.” Mira stated simply while lowering her rocket launcher. “You didn’t specify how.”

“I was going to ask if you could unlock the door – not blow it open!”

“It worked, didn’t it?” the Sunsinger said with a shrug before turning her back on the Hunter. “Now get going. I’m going to do what I can to lock out the Cabal.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m on it.” Gull grumbled as he pressed his way through the narrow opening between the bent doors. “…Blue witch.”

“What was that?” Mira called out in an irritated tone.

After Gull had completely slipped through the opening and found himself in another corridor that led further into the shipyard, he quickly turned to look at Mira through the crack in the doors, who still had her back to him. “I called you a blue witch!” he shouted back before turning and sprinting down the hall.

“I don’t think that’s how you make friends, Gull.” His Ghost told him as he followed the curve of the corridor, slowing down once he saw that another door blocked the end of the hallway.

“If we get out of this I _never_ want to see her again, so I don’t see why I should care.” As the Hunter cautiously approached the door, his eyes scanned for an access panel to unlock the door, to no avail.

“I think it’s locked.” The Ghost pointed out as Gull stopped in front of the door, which still refused to open at his approach.

“Yeah, I can see that.” Gull stated absentmindedly as his eyes continued to search the walls. “Doesn’t look like there’s an access point we can use to open it either,” his gaze continued searching past the wall in front of him, following along the wall on the right. It was then that his eyes landed on a pair of gratings near the roof, and an idea came to mind. “- _but_ maybe we don’t _need_ to go through the front door.”

“What are you-” The Gunslinger didn’t wait for his Ghost to finish as he fired a few bursts from his pulse rifle at the edges of the grating shutters, causing them to fall off when his rounds punched through the bolting. “Oh, great, more dark, cramped passages.” The Ghost deadpanned.

All it took was a short leap for Gull to get a good grip on the vent with one arm as he hoisted himself into the vent and began moving at a low crouch, one hand on the side of the vent and the other still holding his rifle.

It was a straight path to where the air duct let out in the next room, as all the other turns and paths were either too narrow for Gull to crawl through or were blocked by ventilation fans. After a sharp left turn, the Hunter found himself facing another set of metal shutters, leading out and into a circular room.

At its centre was a large, circular holo-terminal where three Psions worked at its wide console while two Legionaries stood at attention on either side of the entrance to the room, likely standing guard.

“Warlock, I’ve found the control room for the shipyard’s guns.” Gull whispered into his helmet’s communicator as he slowly, gradually positioned himself into a sitting position with one of his legs resting against the vent shutters.

“Are you sure?” came the reply over the communicator.

“Well, unless there’s another room with a large holographic display of the turrets on the base, I think I’m at the right one.” He hissed back irritably. “It’s lightly guarded, but the armour the Psions are wearing suggest they’re specialists. It might take a couple of minutes to clear the place.”

“Why are you whispering?” Mira’s Ghost asked. “It’s hard to hear you with all the shooting going on outside.”

“I’m hiding in the vents and I don’t want to draw attention to myself, what else?” he snapped into the comms. before taking a moment to close his eyes and draw in a deep breath, using his Hunter Combat Meditation to centre his focus on what he was about to do. “I’m moving on three.”

“How about you move on one – Beta’s not going to be able to hold off the Cabal for mu-” A sudden burst of static cut Mira off before the distant sounds of gunfire filled her end of the communication feed.

“Mira, report! What’s going on?” Gull waited a few tense seconds as more gunfire continued to erupt from the other end of the line, before it suddenly went quiet.

“Her Ghost cut us off.” The Hunter’s Ghost informed him. “We better move – quickly.”

“Already on it.” He said while drawing the foot resting against the metal shutters back. Gull only stopped when he knee barely grazed his chest, and when it did, he held it there as he raised his weapon to shoulder-level.

_One, two…_ he counted the seconds as air rushed into his lungs and he _felt_ his heartbeat slowing down. The Hunter closed his eyes when he could not take in any more air, while his hands fell into their familiar firing position.

_Three._

Gull’s eyes snapped open the same time his leg shot out, kicking out the air vent a split-second before he pulled on the trigger of his rifle. The weapon in his hands went off in quick bursts as he went through the order of his targets in his mind, his body following his thoughts reflexively as he first killed the two Legionaries standing guard before moving on to the Psions.

The ambush strategy had worked about as well as Gull hoped: he had managed to drop both Legionaries without giving either enough time to even draw their weapons, and managed to injure one of the Psions badly enough that it had a visible hole in its side. However, because of the order of his targets, the Psions still had enough time to duck for cover behind the large holo-terminal – out of Gull’s line of sight.

His only hope now was to get close to them, and that would require him getting out of his vent.

The Hunter had no plans of crawling, however, as he took his left hand off the underside of his pulse rifle and used it to push against the back-wall of the vent. Sure enough, the metal was smooth enough that a hard push was all it took to send Gull sliding out of the air vents and into the control room. As soon as Gull’s feet touched the ground, he immediately threw the rest of his body weight forward in a roll that carried him a few extra feet forward, giving him a clear line of sight on the wounded Psion.

With the reflexes of a natural predator, the Hunter had his rifle trained on the alien adept’s head as soon as he could see him. The Psion, however, had been preparing for this. Before he could pull the trigger, Gull jerked with the motion of his pulse rifle suddenly getting flung from his hands when the Psion sent a pulse of Arc energy aimed at his firing hand.

Gull didn’t even hesitate as he let the weapon go, not bothering to scramble after it and instead capitalise on the opportunity presented. Knowing the Cabal as he did, he knew that Psions that had just used their psionic abilities would be vulnerable for a few seconds because of the exertion. This left Gull with little time as he drew his knife and lunged at the psychic, aiming low and hoping to get under the Psion’s guard.

He succeeded with only a short struggle from the alien before finding the soft joint in its body armour and lodging his knife in the Psion’s hip, twisting it in and up as he wrestled the gun free from its hand.

Disarmed and wounded, the Psion could do little as Gull withdrew his knife from its lower torso and brought it up to slash it along its neck.

Considering the target to have been dealt with, Gull was about to turn his attention to the two remaining Psions when a hand firmly grasped his shoulder and sent a sudden surge of searing-hot pain through his upper torso.

The Human Hunter’s whole body locked up at the pain coursing through it, and it took a great deal of effort to just turn his head far enough to see that it was one of the remaining Psions that had grabbed him, and was now sending a surge of Void energy through his shoulder. Already, cracks in his form that seeped Void light were becoming visible, and were slowly spreading all over his body.

To make matters worse, the other Psion in hiding had come out of cover and was holding its slug rifle level with Gull’s head – letting him know that one move would be fatal, and that no move at all would mean something much worse.

Gritting his teeth hard enough to crush stone, Gull forced his body to move with actions already revised in his mind a dozen times in the span of a second. Reaching back with both arms, he grabbed the wrist that held his shoulder – one hand grabbing the hand while the other jammed the knife already in his hand into the Psion’s wrist – and used the weight of his body to throw the Psion over his shoulder, slamming it against the circular terminal.

In the same instance – before it even had time to pull the trigger, Gull threw his knife at the remaining Psion, striking it in the shoulder and causing it to stagger. The three seconds the Psion took to remove the knife in its armour and train its sights back on Gull was all the time he needed to whip out the fusion rifle strapped to his back.

The Hunter was left with no time to begin charging up the weapon, however, and the Psion took the chance to fire off a couple shots that smacked into Gull’s armour and pierced through his shoulder respectively. He cried out in pain just as the charged shot from the fusion rifle went off and atomised the Psion that had shot him.

He faltered; the shock and pain of the wound in his upper arm too much to bear as he let the weapon fall to his side while his other arm shot up to clutch hole in his armour. The pain alone was almost enough to make him collapse were he stood, but he held on to consciousness with a command on his lips for his Ghost to start the healing process.

The command never came as the sole surviving Psion tackled the Hunter to the ground, pinning him to the floor with both of its hands on Gull’s head. Immediately, a surge of pain like the one that had spread through his shoulder flooded Gull’s head and neck. This time, Gull let out a scream at the intensity of the pain as his vision was tinted purple by the unchecked psionic energy surging into him.

Only after a couple seconds into this slow, painful death did Gull’s vision fill with Void energy and leave him blind to his surroundings. Acting purely on instinct and a desperate hope, Gull tightened his grip on the fusion rifle still in his hand with whatever strength he had left in his numbing fingers and jabbed it against the Psion’s gut. Squeezing and holding on to the trigger felt like an enormous task in that moment, and each second that passed by was more agonising than the last.

Eventually, just when he thought he might explode, a muffled clap of thunder sounded and the weight of the Psion – not to mention the pressure in Gull’s head – was gone. As the Gunslinger’s vision cleared up, there was no more Psion. Just a few ashes floating in the air above him.

“Phew, that was too close.” The sound of his Ghost’s voice both irritated and set him at ease.

“Can you _please_ just heal me? Natural Hunter regeneration rate’s not going to help with the hole in my shoulder.” He hissed when he tried sitting up as a stinging sensation like being electrocuted spread over his upper body. “Doesn’t do anything about the pain, either.”

“Alright, alright. Stop complaining and hold still for a second.” A soothing white light emanated from the Ghost’s eye as it scanned over Gull’s wounds, regenerating the lost flesh there and repairing his armour.

After counting to ten, Gull gave his shoulders an experimental roll and flexed his hands. Feeling only a mild, throbbing pain under the armour, the Gunslinger pushed himself back to his feet and limped over to the holo-terminal. “Alright, let’s get to taking over the guns.” He turned to look at his Ghost. “You know what to do.”

“Right,” the black and red Ghost shell replied hesitantly as it began circling the console for an access point. “-Hack into the console, reprogram the guns, get the Cabal’s attention.”

“Hey,” Gull called out, drawing his Ghost’s attention. “-You’ve got this.” His tone was gentle; the kind of tone a father would use to encourage a son. “You’ve kept me alive this long, now I need you to do this so we can get out of here. Besides, compared to some of the other locks you’ve had to pick, this should be nothing.”

It wasn’t much of an inspirational speech and Gull knew it, but it was the only thing he could think to say to boost his Ghost’s morale. It did the job, however, as the Ghost perked up before getting to work.

“Yeah, you’re right. I’ll be done in a minute.” It said with a curt nod right before projecting a beam on the console.

The Gunslinger moved over to a free spot along the console and opened up an interface. “Good, I’ll see about unlocking that door and try to re-establish comms.” sighing with despondency, Gull got to work. “I _really_ hope they’re not dead.”

* * *

“Ghost, what just hit us?” Mira scowled as she drew her fusion rifle to bear as a sound like rock slamming into metal drew her attention. She aimed the weapon in her hands at the source of the distracting noise: the ceiling.

“I’m not sure,” her Ghost replied while dematerialising, not wanting to be out in the open all of a sudden. “The base doesn’t have exterior cameras right above us, but maybe I can-” it paused as an interface popped up in front of Mira, three sides of the circle on it flashing red. “-Oh no.”

“What is it?”

“A Cabal breach team! They’re trying to-” The Ghost was cut off by the sound of something clamping to the other side of the roof. A second later, that sound was followed by a sound like a power drill burrowing through steel, but Mira knew better.

“They’re trying to make a new entry point.” Mira finished as she crouched down behind the terminal, preparing herself for the fight to come.

Taking a couple deep breaths to steady herself, Mira nearly jumped when a familiar voice suddenly spoke in her ear. “Warlock, I’ve found the control room for the shipyard’s guns.”

“Are you sure?” She asked back, distracted by the fact that the drilling sound had suddenly just stopped.

 “Well, unless there’s another room with a large holographic display of the turrets on the base I think I’m at the right one.” Came the Hunter’s irritated reply. “It’s lightly guarded, but the armour the Psions are wearing suggest they’re specialists. It might take a couple of minutes to clear the place.”

“Why is he whispering?” Mira’s Ghost asked, directing the question at the Warlock before repeating the question into the comm. feed. “Why are you whispering?”

“I’m hiding in the vents and I don’t want to draw attention to myself, what else?” a sigh. “I’m moving on three.”

A dull thud from above drew Mira’s attention to a small spot on the ceiling that was beginning to glow bright red. Her eyes stuck to the spot as she hissed into the communicator. “How about you move on one – Beta’s not going to be able to hold off the Cabal for mu-” Suddenly, a bright flash and a shower of molten metal cut Mira off as she ducked down to shield herself from the explosive discharge.

Immediately following the explosion was a barrage of smart slugs that peppered the control hub. It was as if the Cabal were expecting to find the room filled with Guardians from the way they spaced their shots, most of which were spread out enough that Mira wasn’t hit once.

_Thank the Traveller for poor visibility – this means I’ll be able to get the drop on them,_ Mira thought to herself as she held her breath, trying to remain as motionless as possible as the shooting gradually slowed to a stop.

Although taking cover was unnecessary to avoid getting hit, it was necessary for the Warlock to centre herself and maintain the element of surprise as a couple Legionaries came crashing down through the opening. Despite their jetpacks to slow their descent, the heavy boots they wore still hit the ground hard enough that Mira could feel the impact through the floor – a feeling that soon followed by heavy footsteps as the Cabal searched for their target.

They did not have to search very far, as Mira popped out of cover in a flash with her fusion rifle ready, disintegrating each Legionary in quick succession with rapid energy pulses.

As soon as all the Legionaries in the control hub had been reduced to a scatter of ashes, the Warlock began the processes of reloading her rifle as her eyes searched for a new target. It was only when she heard the familiar sound of a heavy chain gun whirring to life did she notice the Colossus still standing by the hole in the ceiling – its weapon trained on Mira.

“Oh, crap.” She muttered just as the machine gun began spitting out tungsten rounds. This time, Mira ran towards the Colossus while swapping out for her scout rifle, hoping to get under the enormous Cabal trooper’s line of sight and force it down where she had the advantage of mobility.

The plan almost worked, until the Colossus launched a salvo of rockets from its back down the hole and straight at the ground in front of Mira. The explosion that followed threw the Warlock off her feet and threw her into the side of the command platform, where she went limp and slumped to the ground.

When the Sunsinger tried to push herself back to her feet, a sudden shock that ran through the floor caused her to stumble back to the ground. Looking up, Mira saw that the small tremor was the result of the Cabal Colossus having jumped through the hole without any backwards propulsion to slow its fall.

In a way, Mira had gotten what she wanted; the Colossus was now on level ground with her. Unfortunately, it was also only eight and a half feet from her, and its guns were still hot.

“Ghost,” Mira managed to croak out. “-I need The Cure.”

“Already have it loaded for you.” The Ghost replied as a flicker of light flashed in front of the Warlock before she suddenly found her prized rocket launcher in her lap. The Colossus growled as it realised Mira’s intention and pulled the trigger on its weapon, but in its haste aimed a little too high.

The barrage of slugs that came from it struck the side of the command platform a foot above Mira’s head, allowing her the time to heft the heavy weapon onto her shoulder and fire two rockets in quick succession. The first shot threw the Colossus’ aim way off as it reeled back from the pain, before the next one blew its armour open and knocked it flat on its back.

Between heavy, adrenaline-filled pants for breath, Mira checked the remaining ammo in her rocket launcher to see a single rocket left in the magazine – much to her amusement. “Such a universal remedy this rocket launcher is.” She chuckled while pushing herself back to her feet.

“Yes, it sure does seem to solve a lot of our problems.” Her Ghost commented as she moved over to the still corpse of the Colossus, checking it over to see that it was actually dead. When one of its arms lifted off the ground slightly, the Awoken Sunsinger quickly struck it in the face with a surge of fire from her hand. It fell still after that. “Though, it seems we may have a few more on our hands.”

Mira furrowed her brows in confusion at her Ghost’s words, until she looked up and spotted a Harvester through the hole in the ceiling, hovering in place as it turned its search light towards the hole. The Warlock held a hand over her visor as she fired the remaining shot from her rocket launcher at the gunship, aiming with her peripheral vision so as not to be blinded by the glare of the spotlight.

Unfortunately, the blast did little more than throw the gunship off slightly before it returned fire with a salvo of missiles. Most of them managed to make it through the small hole in the ceiling, plummeting straight for Mira and giving the Warlock little precious time to jump out of the way.

Despite being out of the gunship’s line of fire, Mira could not stop herself from panicking when she realised that the barrage of missiles was not letting up. Each rocket that struck the reinforced plating in the floor caused it to become weaker, before suddenly splintering apart in an explosion of hot metal. The very next missile must have struck something important, as it caused several of the terminals in the control hub to overload and give off bursts of sparks.

_They’re going to tear the control hub apart!_ Intentional or not, the plan hinged on using the control hub to link up with the ground cannon on Mars. If it was destroyed-

_If the control hub goes, then we have no plan._

“We have to do something before they destroy the hub!” she exclaimed to her Ghost. “We can’t guide the gun without it.”

“Well I’m all out of ideas.” The Ghost admitted. “What do you suggest?”

Truthfully, Mira was drawing up blanks in her mind as well. She couldn’t fire at it through the hole in the roof if the missile salvo kept up, and there was no other way for her to get outside fast enough. The only feasible plan she could come up with was load another clip of rockets into The Cure and fire back at the Harvester between breaks in the salvo, taking the chance that the Harvester wouldn’t be fast enough to shoot the rockets out of the air – and that the recurring rocket salvo didn’t destroy her first.

The Sunsinger had just materialised a handful of ammunition when a resounding boom filled the control hub, followed by the infinitely louder silence that followed as the barrage of missiles finally ceased. Her eyebrows creasing in confusion, Mira quickly slapped the rounds into her rocket launcher and moved under the opening in the ceiling. She couldn’t help the relieved expression her eyes must have shown when she saw the Harvester spiral out of control as it lost altitude. One of its wings billowed smoke in the place where its engine should be as it spun out of view, crashing a few seconds later with a loud explosion.

Before Mira had time to validate her theory, her Ghost appeared at her side and confirmed her suspicions when another voice spoke through it. “Mira, it’s Gull. Are you still there?”

Breathing out a sigh of relief, Mira responded with a casual, “We’re still here.” She paused for a second with her finger still on the comms. before asking, “Was that you?”

“You mean the Harvester that just went down? Yeah, that was me. We just gained control of the guns – it was the first target that showed up.” The Hunter replied.

“Cutting it a little close, aren’t we?” Mira asked rhetorically as she moved over to the command platform, checking to see that it still worked. “Another minute and they would have blasted a hole right through the control hub.”

“Well there were more of them than I thought in here. Guns should be firing on automatic right about now, though.” On cue with his words, several more booms of cannon fire could be heard from outside. Reaching across one of the terminals, Mira opened a live roster of all the ships airborne around the base, a certain satisfaction crossing Mira’s face as she watched the status for each ship turn red as heavy, accelerated rounds brought them down – unaware of the threat until it was too late.

“Good. That should reduce their numbers.” Mira thought out loud while opening up another display to track the carrier’s position. “And now we wait for the carrier to come within firing range.”

The Gunslinger took that moment to interject her thoughts. “How do we know this will actually draw the carrier in? They could send any other destroyer or battleship if they wanted to send more reinforcements.”

“Because the carrier is likely the only ship with enough firepower on its own to completely annihilate this base.” Mira stated as if it was a simple fact.

“It’s still a gamble.” Gull argued. “They could send the rest of the fleet instead and have more than enough firepower to wipe this base off the map.”

“It’ll work!” Mira declared, though her confidence waivered slightly at Gull’s sound logic. _It has to…_

 Before Mira could get another thought out, the front doors to the control hub were suddenly blown apart as an object hurtled through the smoke coming from down the corridor and landed at the foot of the command platform.

The Warlock’s gun was already trained on the motionless object, but she lowered her rifle when she realised that the smoking object was actually Beta Tauri’s lifeless body – still burning from whatever had hit it.

Copperhead appeared over his Guardian a split-second later, its shell open and waiting for another Guardian to share their Light to revive his charge. Mira wasted no time vaulting over the front of the command platform and reaching out for the Ghost, but as soon as her hand touched Copperhead’s inner sphere, she felt his words in her mind.

“We’ve got a problem.”


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Overpowered and with their heavy-hitter down, the Guardians will have to think smart and think fast if they want to survive.
> 
> Every second counts in this race to stop the biggest threat The City has yet to face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: I come bearing good tidings. So, first of, this chapter...phew, it's taken me a while to write. Pretty sure it's the longest one I've written for...anything. It took a bit of deliberation, but in the end I decided NOT to subject all of you to a 10K word chapter.
> 
> Instead, this chapter will be the shorter half of the humongous chapter I decided to split in two. The other half of the chapter is already written and cleaned up, and will go up in about 36 hours, or less. I'll try to keep the chapters more curt but well...there's a lot of action that goes on and, well I get carried away.

**Shipbase Metus, Deimos, in orbit around Mars…**

Priming another swarm grenade, Gull threw it blindly over his shoulder as he curled up behind the terminal he was using for cover. In one hand, the Hunter held the grip of his rifle so tightly, it was sure to leave an indentation in the shape of his hand – it would need replacing if anyone else intended to use the pulse rifle after he was gone. _Assuming the Cabal don’t melt it down after I’m gone._

In his other hand, he clutched Beta’s severed right arm, warped by heat and blackened by gunfire. It was all Gull managed to pull off the Titan’s remains before a fresh garrison of Cabal shocktroopers came surging into the compact space of the control hub, their slug throwers firing non-stop as they made their advance.

“Mira, for the love of The Traveler, please tell me you’re nearly done!” Gull shouted out while aiming out of cover, firing blindly from around the terminal until a shard of shrapnel caught him in the hand and he pulled back.

“Shut up and keep the fire off me!” The Warlock shouted back through the comms. Gull had lost Mira soon after the shooting picked up and the first Centurion charged through the front door, but at the very least, it sounded like she had not abandoned him.

“What are you even _doing_? I thought I was covering your escape!” he yelled while swapping magazines.

“Well, I changed my mind!” The Warlock snapped back, a solar grenade flying overhead and towards the encroaching wall of Cabal as she spoke.

Just as he was about to take another pot shot from behind cover, a heavy slug pierced straight through his cover – just above where his shoulder was. Growling under his breath, Gull waited for his shields to stop flaring before dashing out of cover and running around the length of the command platform.

Chancing a glance over his shoulder, Gull got to watch as his cover was obliterated by a hail of rockets from a Colossus. Shots and rockets trailed after him as he ran, striking the ground and walls where he might have been a second before, and coming to a stop when the Hunter made a sharp turn and slid around the back of the platform. “This really _does_ just keep getting better and better.” The Gunslinger muttered while swapping out his pulse rifle for his fusion rifle, gingerly putting Beta’s severed arm down.

He was ready to peek around his new – likely temporary – cover, when something in his peripheral vision caught his eye. A brief flash of royal-blue and red out of the top of his eyesight drew Gull’s attention to the hunched over figure of Mira.

“By the Light, what-”

“I said shut up!” the Sunsinger shouted back. “I need to concentrate!” Her Ghost was nowhere in sight as she accessed the console in front of her, hands dancing frantically over the interface as rounds bounced off the console around her – just barely missing her head.

One micro-rocket even came so far as to cause her shielding to flare, missing her head by a hair’s width.

Growling under his helmet, Gull readied one of his spare knives as he stepped around cover. He flicked it sideways so that it spun horizontally after taking half a second to choose a target out of the wall of Cabal artillery storming their way – whatever good _that_ might do.

“So help me, Mira, I will leave you here to die alone if you don’t stop pretending like you have a plan!” Gull yelled while skulking back into cover, materialising his machine gun in his hands – its last clip already in the barrel.

“Oh, quit being dramatic!” This time, the Warlock _actually_ turned her head to yell at the Human – leaving him briefly dazed – before quickly turning back to the console and muttering, “Ye of little faith.”

Gull was a second away from making another retort when a siren suddenly sounded, followed by a series of flashing red and orange lights in the room. The Gunslinger hardly had any time to process what was happening before Mira slid down from the platform and tugged him by the arm.

There was barely any warning before Mira started sprinting, which Gull matched after reaching down to pick up Beta’s arm.

A second later, dense clouds of greyish gas poured from hidden nozzles in the ceiling and walls, blanketing both the Guardians and the Cabal garrison as Mira led him through the wild spray of fire and through a door.

It took Gull all of two seconds to realise what was happening before he shook himself free from Mira’s grasp. He ignored her questioning look as he spotted the door controls on their side of the corridor, summoning his Ghost with the wave of a hand. “Ghost, lock it!”

The floating spark of Light darted over to the control panel before it had even fully materialised, working faster than normal to shut the blast doors behind them and lock them, drifting to one side quickly as Gull wordlessly brought the stock of his pulse rifle down on it.

When he pulled away, the Hunter was breathing heavily as he shook bits of fibro-glass off the end of his gun as his Ghost floated up to face-height, its eye silently asking if he was all right. A few deep breaths later, Gull waved the Ghost off with Beta’s severed arm as he turned to face Mira. “ _That_ was the plan?”

“Yes, actually.” Mira spat back while she composed herself and reloaded her weapons. “That was the _only_ plan I could think of where we even stood a chance of living to see another day, so if you’ve got a problem with it, you can go right back out there and shoot at the Cabal until your fingers bleed Light!”

Her words echoed down the empty hall as Gull held her stare, not breathing as he processed the burning fury behind them and considered his response. Looking down at the floor briefly, he turned back to the Sunsinger and nodded his head. “Good plan.” He admitted, putting no small effort into making sure his words did not come off as sarcastic. “What was that, anyway? Automatic fire extinguishers?”

This time, the Warlock had to pause before replying, likely taking a moment to assess whether the Gunslinger was being candour. “Uh, fire suppression system, actually- not a very different distinction, though.” She replied awkwardly.

“Right,” Gull mused while rolling his eyes as subtly as he could. _Once a Warlock, always a Warlock._ “You, uh, still got Copperhead?” he asked while waving Beta’s arm about.

“Huh? Oh, yeah!” Stowing away her weapons for now, Mira held up a free palm as Copperhead materialised over it.

“I hope you realise you I wasn’t going to make it either if you ditched us.” Copperhead said pointedly as he floated over to the Gunslinger.

“Yes, the thought crossed my mind once or twice.” He responded sarcastically while tossing Beta’s arm to the floor.

“Is that it?” Copperhead asked, his attention now on the remains of his Guardian. “ _This_ was all you managed to pull off Beta?”

“Well the Cabal didn’t exactly wait on me to disassemble ‘im before coming in.” Gull retorted before waving towards the severed arm. “You can still bring Beta back faster with this, right?”

Floating closer to examine it, the bronze Ghost blinked its red eye a couple times before sighing and drifting back up to look at both Guardians. “Not by much. You might as well have just taken his hand.” He droned as his body expanded to spread out its Light, casting it downwards to envelop the arm. “Or, like, three fingers.”

As Copperhead finished speaking, a fountain of sparks suddenly burst forth from the fine line where the blast doors sealed shut. _They’re cutting through_. “Better get started then, cause I don’t think that door’s going to hold.”

Grumbling to himself, Copperhead’s Light began to glow brighter and brighter. Around this time Beta’s severed arm began glowing as well, shedding its outer layers like ashy flakes as the metal bent back into shape and the rest of the body began forming from it.

Gull had seen this done more times than he can count – experienced it first-hand a few times, too. Any time a Guardian died, their Ghost would use their Light to heal their body of all grave wounds before pouring the Light it shared with its soldier back into the empty vessel. Of course, it was always easier – and quicker – when the body was intact. Otherwise, Ghosts could still regenerate lost limbs and even entire bodies, but the process took much longer, which left both Ghost and Guardian vulnerable to attack.

When he chanced a glance back at the door a few seconds later, Beta was still only halfway healed.

And the Cabal were almost through the door.

He cursed as he paced, the Gunslinger weighing up their options while the bronze Ghost worked as fast as it could to revive Beta. “We could bottleneck them through the door…but Copperhead would still be out in the open. We could…we could chain explosives – that might hold them off for… six seconds because they have _shields_ – dammit!”

“Gull, we don’t have time.” Mira spoke up while rounding the downed Titan.

“I know.”

“The Cabal will have killed us all by the time Beta’s repairs are done.” She continued when she stopped at his side.

“I _know_.”

“Which is why you need to take Beta and _go_!” Mira said, louder enough this time for Gull to hear her over his own frustrations.

The Hunter froze in his tracks as he stared at the Warlock, no words coming out of his mouth for the first few seconds. “Excuse me?”

“At the end of the hallway is a power shaft.” She explained, her tone cold and analytical. “It leads up to the communications room; all you have to do is follow the cables.”

“You want me to leave you here?” Gull asked, urging for clarification.

“I’m a Sunsinger, Gull. I can bring myself back once if they down me, but you need to trust me on this. You’ll be Beta’s only line of defence-”

“Alright.”

“While I hold them of long enough for you to-”

“I said ‘alright’!” Gull interrupted, louder this time, as he stowed his guns and reached out to grab Copperhead and retract its shell, much to the Ghost’s chagrin.

“Really?” Mira asked, her body language conveying her confusion. “Just like that?”

“Well, if you think you’ve got it…” Gull reasoned while lifting up Beta’s half-repaired body over one of his shoulders.

“It was…just your tone and diction, I thought…”

“Just wanted to be sure about the plan.” The Hunter called out after taking off at a jog down the corridor. “Good luck!”

If Mira gave a response, he was too far away to hear it. A couple seconds later, Gull heard the blast doors being blown open and a percussion of gunfire. A few _more_ seconds later, his Ghost called out, “Guardian down.”

“Thanks, Gh-”

“Guardian back up!”

“ _Thank you_ , Ghost.” Gull repeated as the end of the hallway came within sight, though not the sight the Hunter had hoped for.

The door before them was sealed shut, with no panel or console with which to open it. Running out of options, the Gunslinger decided that now was as peaceful as it would get and dropped Beta’s half-repaired body on the ground in front of the door. Only then did he release the iron grip he had on Copperhead in his other hand, letting the Ghost fly free and turn to shoot him a glare.

“Don’t _ever_ grab me like that again.” The Ghost growled as it zipped threateningly close to Gull’s face. “Where I’m from, that’s called a ‘dick move’.”

Gull mused on Copperhead’s words for a few seconds before shaking his head. “Mm, no they don’t.”

“Um, yeah, they do.” Copperhead argued.

“I’ve grabbed other Ghosts before. They never had a problem with it.”

“Well then they’re assholes.” Copperhead shouted. “What was the context behind the grab?”

The brunette opened his mouth to respond, but another explosion from down the hall – much closer this time – cut off whatever thought he had. “Revive your Guardian first, talk later.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Copperhead said dismissively as he floated back over to Beta’s body and resumed the resurrection process. Meanwhile, Gull held out his free hand to summon his own Ghost.

“See if you can find a way to get this thing open.” He ordered, letting the spark fly off to do its job while he trained his rifle down the hallway to provide some cover, anticipating an attack as the sounds of fire and explosion got closer.

After a couple seconds of staring down the hallway, he suddenly felt an anxious pull in the other direction despite his armour’s sensors not picking up anything. Knowing to trust his instincts, however, Gull kept his senses alert for any surprises. Sure enough, the hiss of the doors behind them parting drew his attention so fast Gull could feel the whiplash even as he aimed down the sights.

“Gull-” his Ghost called out just as the doors parted to reveal two Psion assassins, weapons trained on the two Ghosts. He pulled the trigger on his pulse rifle four times to down the two, before a loud, nearby explosion made him turn back around.

The Hunter nearly fired again, before realising that the figure that rounded the corner was Mira. Her robes were giving off steam and had holes burnt right through them in some places, but otherwise she didn’t look injured – just tired.

Gull made to go help her, but then Beta suddenly bolted upright and started screaming. The surprise of it was so sudden that the Gunslinger could only watch as Beta steadied his breathing and the Warlock limped over – resting some of her weight against the wall.

“Whoa, you guys! I just had the _craziest_ dream! You were there, and you were there, and – oh, Copperhead!” he greeted as the Ghost flew by his head. “Good to see you, pal!”

“Help him up, we’ve still got company coming this way.” Mira ordered as she skipped by them. Gull did as she asked, looping one of his arms under Beta’s to help hoist him to his feet – just as the sound of many, many heavy footsteps from down the hallway reached his ears.

Gull moved as fast as he could, only slightly hindered by Beta’s added weight as the Exo took a moment to get his bearings. As he looked around, his feet began moving in time with Gull’s. “Wait a minute…where are we? How did I get here?” Once they were far away enough from the door, the Hunter made sure he could stand upright by himself before going over to help Mira close the doors. “This isn’t the little Exo’s room.”

“I carried you here, you were dead.” Gull spoke in a rushed, single breath as he turned to Mira, who was frantically typing at a console. “Why isn’t this door closed yet?”

“Seems like the Cabal had the foresight to lock down their terminals from here on out.” The Warlock hissed between gritted teeth. “I can’t do anything with this – we’ll have to trigger a manual lockdown.”

“Ok…how do we do that?” Gull was now taking worried glances down the hall as the footsteps got closer.

Taking her scout rifle off her back, Mira brought the rifle’s stock down on the console, cracking its monitor, before firing at it while taking a step backwards. The console sparked with each shot before suddenly exploding after the fifth shot, showering all three Guardians in sparks.

The Hunter took the time to brush the sparks off his armour before turning to stare out into the hallway. “Door’s still open.”

“There’s a lever on the wall there.” Mira stuck her hand out while her head swivelled around like an owl. “Pull it, and the doors will seal shut.”

Following the Awoken’s instructions, Gull rushed over to the far wall, spotting the first signs of the Cabal garrison when he glanced down the hall. He skidded to a stop seconds before slamming his shoulder into the wall, but when his eyes ran over it, he hesitated. “What colour?”

“Red lever!”

The Gunslinger’s eyes homed in on the only red lever on the wall, grabbing it with both hands and using all of his strength to pull it down just as the first few micro-rockets came sailing in through the opening. As soon as the lever turned as far as it would go, an alarm went off and the doors slammed together with more force than normal, cutting them off from the encroaching garrison of shock troopers.

A few dull thumps followed as rounds continued to slam into the blast doors while Gull took the time to swap out the ammunition in his rifle. “That door isn’t going to hold any better than the last one. What are our options?”

Mira continued to move along the wall, her hands searching for something. “The communications dish is right above us. There’ll be a terminal somewhere up there that I can use to aim the antimatter cannon at the Cabal Carrier with. It’ll take some time to hack through the security, but I calculate that I can get it done before they come within range of an orbital bombardment.”

It was only then that Gull got a chance to look up and note that the maintenance shaft ran vertically up through the whole facility; light pouring in through grated hatches and portals spaced out along the walls. The power lines that ran along the walls split and turned in different directions at varying heights, but otherwise there did not look to be any way to scale it.

“You want to get up there?” Gull asked rhetorically. “How exactly do you suggest we get all the way up _there_?”

The Warlock stopped in her movements as her right hand hit the lid of a hidden panel. Prying it open, Mira slapped whatever was behind the panel – likely a button – with her open palm. A couple seconds after she did so, the shaft above them hissed out jets of hot air before wide rectangular plates popped out of the walls at different intervals – reaching all the way to the top.

When the last plate ejected itself, the Sunsinger turned to regard the other two Guardians before gesturing upwards. “We climb.”

_She definitely had this thought out._ Gull thought to himself. _How the hell did she have time to think this out?_

A menacing scuttling sound in the low-hanging maintenance ducts drew Gull’s attention briefly before it was then drawn to the sound of metal burning metal behind them, the Cabal flanking them from two directions.

“Well then,” Copperhead spoke up. “I suggest we take our chances with the vertical parkour.”


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Ok, maybe it took me more than 36 hours to get this off, but it's here.
> 
> Ya'll can put the torches down.

**Maintenance Shaft-11, Shipbase Metus, Deimos, in orbit around Mars…**

“Are you _sure_ these things are safe to climb on?” The Hunter asked as his feet hit the top of the next plate up the shaft, two plates below Mira and a plate above Beta. “I can feel how hot they are through my boots.”

“They’re just heat sinks, Gull.” She called back while pulling herself up the next plate, her hands sweating in her gloves where she felt heat radiating through the material. “The Cabal use them to keep the power lines in the walls and such cool. Nothing to fret about. Just, maybe don’t stand on them too long?”

“Duly noted.” The Gunslinger called up the shaft, his voice followed by the sounds of footsteps thumping against the metal and glass of the sinks. “How much further to the top?”

Craning her head back, Mira squinted as she considered the exact distance to the exit hatch for a split-second, before deciding to just count the number of heat sinks left to climb. “Another three heat sinks left, then all we have to do is climb up the-” Mira was interrupted as the facility shook with a low rumble, forcing her to concentrate on her footing so as to not fall off the plate she was on. “The hatch.”

“Good,” Gull replied, with one hand on an electrical cable attached to the wall for support. “Then we can find out what’s making all that noise.” As the sentence left his lips, a volley of heavy slugs flew upwards from the floor beneath them, striking the undersides of the heat sinks and the ceiling far above.

“Looks like they’re catching up.” The Warlock thought aloud, turning her gaze downwards to where several Legionnaires and Psions were using their jump packs to climb the heat sinks – still several metres below them, but already taking pot shots. Mira turned her attention to the Titan further down. “Beta!”

The white and blue Exo primed a grenade in his hand when Mira called his name, calling back, “Fire in the hole!” before dropping the grenade down the shaft. “Wheeee!” After two and a half seconds, the grenade exploded in a blinding flash of Arc energy that dazzled the Cabal soldiers climbing after them.

Mira felt the heat sink she was on shake when Gull threw his weight at it, just barely grabbing on with both hands. “That’s not going to hold them back for long.” He stated between grunts of effort, trying to pull himself the rest of the way up.

“Then I suggest,” Offering him a hand, the Gunslinger hesitated for a second before taking it. “We move quicker.” She finished while helping Gull up to his feet. Once he had both feet planted on the plate, the indigo-haired Awoken skipped upwards and gently hovered within clambering distance of the next heat sink up.

Gull looked like he was going to jump up after her, but paused when they both heard the sound of auto rifle fire just below them. “Beta, hurry up or we’re leaving you here!” the Hunter hollered, which put an abrupt end to the shooting.

“Oh, wait for me! Wait for me!” Beta called back up before rocketing up from his position. Given the propulsion behind his jump and the trajectory he was on, Mira estimated that the Exo would have been able to land perfectly on the next heat sink without any issue.

Well, would have, if the Titan’s foot had not caught the sink plate on his way up, causing him to pivot vertically and land face-first on top of the plate. A muffled “Ow,” followed his fall before he picked himself back up. “I’m ok! We’re ok!”

Mira didn’t wait this time as she jumped up to the next heat sink, continuing until she was at the last one needed to reach the hatch. Gull was not far behind, pausing between jumps to aim his rifle down the shaft. One heat sink behind her, however, he paused. “Uh, Mira? They’re falling back.”

The Warlock turned to look directly at the Gunslinger. “What?”

“The Cabal; they’re climbing back down.” He turned what she assumed was a worried glance at her. “They’re not even shooting up at us.”

“That…definitely doesn’t bode well.” Mira replied while looking for herself. Sure enough, the Legionnaires that had been so intent on pursuing them were now dropping back down. “What are they-”

Suddenly, a sound like hydraulics compressing reverberated up the shaft. The sound repeated after a couple seconds, and it was only after the third time that Mira saw what was causing it.

“The heat sinks are retracting!” she called out.

“They must have figured out an override.” Her Ghost told her, alarm clear in its tone.

Gull turned to shoot the Warlock what she presumed was a look of urgency. “Get the hatch open!” he yelled while taking a running start to get up to her plate.

Not wanting to be told twice, Mira turned her attention to the number of buttons and switches around the hatch before finding the one that would open the hatch. Pressing her index to it, the seal on the hatch split into several wedges that retracted backwards, leaving her a clear entrance to the next room. Without looking back, the Sunsinger jumped through it with her scout rifle ready in case there was something on the other side.

After doing a quick visual sweep and assessing that it was, in fact, an empty room, Mira turned to watch Gull jump up through the hatch halfway and push himself up the rest of the way. A sense of relief washes over them now that they were out of danger – Mira knows her Ghost feels it too, but the sense of urgency comes back when she realises they’re down a man.

“Beta.” Is all she says before crouching over the lid of the hatch, watching as the Titan jumps from plate to plate while two plates retract for every one he manages to jump on. “Beta, hurry!”

“Imma hurrying!” he calls back after a jump, just managing to grab on to the next plate. It was no good though, the Striker was still a plate behind the optimal jumping distance, and the retracting plates had nearly caught up to him.

Just as he was about to make his next jump, Mira called out to him. “Beta, you’re not going to make it in time! You have to jump straight for the hatch!”

“What? We’ll never make that distance!” Copperhead cried out in alarm over the frequency.

“I’ll catch you – don’t worry.” Mira replied, though her tone wasn’t very convincing.

The Warlock wasn’t very convinced herself. She could only reach out so far without running to risk of slipping down the shaft with the Titan, and she wasn’t sure if a single vertical jump could actually clear the gap between them.

But what choice did they have left?

Beta looked hesitant – for obvious reasons, but jumped anyway as the heat sink just below him pulled back into the wall. An emission trail of light drifted in the Striker’s wake as he soared upwards, past the other two plates in his way while his upward momentum was gradually lost. It almost seemed like he would make the distance until-

Until his jets cut off mid-flight and Beta lost his forward momentum – inches from Mira’s outstretched arm.

Reflexively, the Warlock stretched out even further to try to grab the Titan, but he was already falling the other way. There was no way she could reach him now, unless…

Twisting her wrist one way and flexing her fingers into a sign, Mira’s outstretched hand suddenly began glowing faintly with Light, leaping between her fingers in white-violet wisps. As she curled those fingers into a tight fist, the same aura enveloped Beta’s armour and slowed his fall to a near-complete stop. Her eyes shut, Mira concentrated on the extension of her power as she drew her hand back towards her chest, causing Beta to drift through the air towards her.

When Mira felt he was close enough, her free hand shot out to grab his hand as the aura around him faded. Gravity seemed to catch up to Beta when it did, and Mira found herself bearing his full weight as she used both hands to pull him up the rest of the way.

The hatch sealed shut as soon as Beta cleared the opening, nearly severing his left foot as Mira and Gull dragged him up against a wall. With her companion safe, Mira finally allowed herself to breathe a sigh of relief, slumping over forward as a wave of nausea and exhaustion washed over her.

“What was that?” Gull asked after a beat of silence, filled only by the Sunsinger’s heavy breathing.

“Warlock magic.” She lied. “Probably.”

“Can we do it again?” Beta chimed in as he pushed himself back to his feet.

“Uh, not for as long as I live.” Copperhead groaned as he materialised next to Beta. “That was too close.”

“Suck it up; we’re still not out of this yet.” Gull said in reprimand as his eyes searched the room they were in. “Where are we? This doesn’t look like the dish.”

“It’s…it’s over in the next room.” Mira managed to say while getting her breathing back under control. She stuck out a finger towards a door on one side of the room. “Through there.” Without warning, Gull marched straight towards the door, which slid open automatically for him. “Hang on, we don’t know how many hostiles-”

“It’s clear.” The Hunter called back, causing Mira to pause – surprised. Sure enough, she found the control centre of the communications tower to be devoid of enemies when she walked in.

“Curious.” The Warlock muttered to herself.

“Maybe our luck’s finally turning around.” Gull’s Ghost offered, though Mira only saw it as false optimism.

“It’s rarely about luck with the Cabal. This must be part of their protocol or tactics, for whatever reason.” The Warlock thought aloud while walking over to the main console in the room, which was smaller than the ones back in the control hub. Glancing about, Mira also noted that the control room in the communications tower was little more than a metal box with reinforced glass windows that overlooked most of the Shipbase. Though she couldn’t see it, Mira also knew there was a large receiver dish on top of the tower, accessible by the hatch on the ceiling. Hanging from the walls and ceiling were a collection of datascreens and monitors, all parsing data rapidly and angled towards the main console.

“So?” Gull asked while lowering his rifle in one hand. “Can you still aim the gun from up here?”

Taking a second to stare blankly at the console in front of her, Mira sighed as her Ghost materialised by her shoulder. “By all accounts, I should be able to. Though it will be harder to pinpoint the Carrier’s position without an accurate map to plot by – keeping in mind the fact that we’ll only get one shot at this, and I have to make sure that one shot hits the-” Mira’s grip on the console tightened as another explosion shook the tower. “Quantum…field generator.”

When the tremors finally stopped, Beta walked over to the window on the left. “That came from over here.”

Gull joined him at the window a second later, leaning against the window to get a better look at the facility below them. Hissing a second later, he stepped back to get to Mira’s side. “They’re taking out the anti-air guns.”

“How many are there left?” Mira asked without taking her eyes off the console in front of her as she and her Ghost worked quickly to breach the security systems.

“Three, and they’re not holding off the Harvesters very well. Someone’s gotta go out there and deal with them before we lose all our air cover and the Harvesters start looking for something new to shoot at.”

“Uh, hey Gull? I don’t think it’s the Harvesters we should be worrying about.” Copperhead chimed in. When the Hunter moved back over to the window the Ghost turned back to face outside. “Look down there, by that turret…see that?”

“Demolition squads.” Gull growled.

“ _They’re_ the ones shaking up the building.”

“Easier to deal with too.” Gull’s Ghost added. “Now all we need is to figure out who’s going to deal with them.”

“And how; it’s at least a sixty foot drop to get to the roof of the shipbase.” Copperhead countered as he backed away from the window.

“Too busy!” Mira called out.

“Why don’t we both go?” Gull asked, turning to face Beta. “Mira can handle herself up here, and one Guardian can distract the Harvesters while the other-”

“Gets lunch!”

“…I was gonna say takes care of the demolition teams.” Gull finished after a beat of silence.

“Oh, that’s even better.” Beta agreed while priming his auto rifle.

“Great, now step aside,” Gull warned as he brought his rifle to bear on one point on the window. “Don’t want to accidentally hit you with a stray bullet.” A second later, the Hunter fired two bursts at the window, striking the same spot with all six rounds.

Unfortunately, it left little more than a thin crack in the window. “That glass was matterweaved with layers of crystalline granite,” Mira explained, stepping away from the console to approach the chip in the glass Gull managed to make. “It’s designed to withstand direct blasts from rocket launchers and windstorms of six-hundred miles per hour. You can bet it’s not going to break even if you used every round in your reserve.” In her open palm, a growing orb of fire was taking shape as she flexed her fingers. “What you want is not to hit it with blunt-force trauma, but instead, with a little heat.” When the fireball had grown to an acceptable size, Mira thrust her open palm into the window, hitting the glass with the superheated energy concentrated in the palm of her hand.

When the fire died down, the spot that Gull had fired on was now a large crater of warped, twisted and cracked glass.

But it was still intact.

Mira continued to stare at the crater she made for a stunned second before remembering herself after blinking a couple times. Immediately, she went through the motions of calling up another force projection in her hand. “And…after that, a small shockwave should…should shatter the glass.” The Warlock fumbled with her words, speaking them as they came to mind while trying to act like this was what she had intended to happen.

The shockwave it created caused the cracks already there to grow deeper, and a few glass chips to fall out, but the window remained otherwise intact.

“Huh,” Mira exclaimed as her hands fell to her side. “That…usually works.”

“Maybe it’s double-glazed?” Gull said in a mocking tone.

From under her helmet, Mira narrowed her eyes at the Gunslinger as Copperhead spoke up. “You amateurs better step back and let the master handle this.” Beta moved in front of the glass crater, cracking his knuckles as his Ghost talked. “Beta, do your thing.”

Rearing back his right hand, Beta’s fingers curled into a fist behind his back – his swing arch was so wide, he almost hit Mira when he drew it back. When his fist went back as far as it would go, Beta hesitated for a second before jabbing it forward at near-supersonic speed, the front of his fist briefly crackling with lightning as it made contact with the window.

From the centre of the crater, splits and cracks spread all over the window. A half-second later, the glass _shattered_ with a crash that rings in the Sunsinger’s ears. “Boop!” he said gleefully while holding his pose by the window.

For a moment, all Mira can do is stare in stunned silence – _again_ – as a surprisingly strong gust of wind from outside scatters some of the glass shards around the room. Eventually, Gull’s voice broke her out of her stupor. “I loosened it up for you both.”

Her jaw set, she turned to shoot the Hunter another look before turning back to walk over to the console. “Uh, Mira,” Beta’s nervous tone made her stop to turn around. “You…you sure you don’t need any backup up here?”

“Trust me, Beta. Your help will be more valuable down there while I-” she gasped, alarmed as a Harvester rises up in front of the broken window – shining its searchlight directly on the three Guardians. Reflexively, she reaches for the fusion rifle strapped to her back and begins unloading charge after charge at it.

Gull is soon to follow suit when he realises the danger, drawing out his own fusion rifle and aiming for the engines.

Their combined firepower does little damage, however, and the Harvester turns its dorsal cannon on them soon after. Its rocket capsule spins into place, loading in a fresh salvo of rockets to blast apart the Guardians.

Just as Mira depleted the last charge in her rifle – with an order to retreat on the tip of her tongue, Copperhead spoke up in a laid-back tone. “Hey Beta, think you’ve got another one in you?”

“Uh, maybe,” Beta said, hesitant at first before pumping his fist in front of him. “Yeah, yeah I do. I got another one!” the Titan then charged towards the open window, skipping at the last moment into a small hop that propelled him through the hole of reinforced glass – throwing himself right into the Harvester.

“Beta, wait!” Gull called out a second too late as the Striker’s fists became charged with Arc energy, his whole body crackling with power as he drove both fists into the front of the Cabal gunship, caving in the front of the ship and causing one of the engines to blow out. The Harvester immediately lost control and quickly plummet to the ground – with Beta still on it.

Far below, on the roof of the shipyard, the Harvester crashed partway through the roof, but fortunately did not explode.

“I’d better go down there to see if-”

“Just go.” Mira cut him off in a low voice that reflected her frustration with the whole situation. She turned away from the window just as Gull threw himself through a more fractured patch of glass in the window, heading straight down to where Beta landed. “Can’t I ever work with someone professional?” the Warlock muttered to herself, resuming her work at the console.

“Well, I think we tried that before,” Mira’s Ghost replied. “Though, if I remember correctly, you drove them all off back during that Venus expedition a year ago. Something about…not being able to handle you was what they said, I think.”

“We are not having this discussion right now.” The Sunsinger snapped back, just as she sliced a sequence that gave her access to communication and mapping data. “…Though if we were, I’d like to point out that they were clearly in dire need of leadership, and were ill-informed about the operations we went on.”

“Right,” Her Ghost drawled with an eye-roll. “’Ill-informed’ is a funny way of saying you withheld information about the mission from them, y’know? And what do you mean, ‘in need of leadership’? Cartus was the one leading the expedition; he literally had more experience navigating the dark side of Venus than _anyone_ at the Tower.”

“It was a need-to-know basis – which they agreed to when they signed up for the mission, by the by.” Mira shot back, pointing an accusing finger at her Ghost. “Besides, I could have traversed the Silver Plateaus by myself if I wanted to; Cartus was just there to make sure my Intel was good.”

“Aren’t you forgetting about the part where you tricked them into following you down the Obsidian Catacombs for a week and a half?”

“Most of them knew where we were headed; I gave them a chance to back out if they wanted.” Mira pointed out just as she began a scan for the Cabal Carrier’s comm. signature. “Besides, I got everyone out of there – I don’t see why you have such a problem with the Catacombs.”

“I don’t have a problem with the Catacombs. My problem is that we could have _lost_ people down there. And getting out was a team effort; everyone played an important part.” The Ghost shot back.

“Debatable,” Mira said with a shrug before her expression hardened. “Now be quiet and start rendering a map of the Carrier’s position, I said we weren’t having this discussion now.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Her Ghost replied in a monotone voice as it began interfacing with another nearby screen to collect transmission telemetry.

_Why can’t everyone be as compliant as my Ghost_? Mira wondered as she reached out to pull one of the hinged datascreens closer to her. _It’s not like my requests are absurd…or don’t contribute greatly to our continued surviv-_

Another explosion – closer this time, shook the communications tower and abruptly cut off Mira’s thoughts when she took one hand off the datascreen to balance herself. After a couple of seconds, the shaking slowed to a gentle rumble. With a grunt of frustration, Mira pushed off the console to walk over to the nearby window on her right.

“What are those two-” Mira’s irritated muttering was cut short by what she saw when she peered down through the unbroken glass. There was a familiar prickle of static and dark energy down the back of Mira’s neck as she watched two Harvesters – several floors down – cycle their weapon systems after just having unloaded a barrage of rounds into the side of the communications tower. The feeling only acted up when the chances of failure were high, and brought about a sense of imminent dread as another salvo of rockets struck the side of the tower.

_We’ve run out of time._

“Mira, what’s-”

“I told you to be quiet!” she snapped at her Ghost after shakily stalking back over to the main console, smacking her hand against a touch screen and activating a holo-projection of isolated signals from the Cabal Carrier – and the coordinates of where they were sent from. When plotted against the three-dimensional map the Warlock’s Ghost managed to render, they showed the path the massive ship’s trajectory was taking it on its approach to Shipbase Metus.

“Checkmate in five minutes, you extrasolar imperialists.” The Sunsinger sneered as she opened up another broadcast channel, punching in the frequency codes Lakshmi sent. “I’d like to see your smart armour protect you from this.”

* * *

“Keep running, Beta!” Gull called out as the Titan stopped to reload his weapon. “We gotta be more mobile to keep them distracted.”

“Ow, sorry – it’s just so hard to reload when I’m running – ow, I just can’t – ow – get the magazine in with all the shaking.” Beta replied while taking cover behind a large power battery so he could finish reloading.

“Rrgh, if you can’t keep up, then lead them in the other– split their attention. Keep their reinforcements chasing after you, then circle back around to – dammit – pick off the demolition teams.” Gull yelled back while jumping amidst a flurry of micro-rockets that criss-crossed the air around him. A particularly lucky shot managed to clip the Gunslinger in the waist as he twisted his body, throwing off his momentum when he landed with his ankles twisted around one another. A short grunt of pain was all that left Gull’s mouth before he tripped and rolled behind the broken wing of a Harvester that had embedded itself in the metal roof.

“Oh, no.” Beta exclaimed as he watched two other Cabal ground squads group up with the one that had targeted Gull, now all working together to close in on the Hunter’s position.

“Don’t even think about it.” Copperhead warned, but Beta _was_ thinking about it. When the large squad of Cabal footsoldiers began firing as one on Gull’s position a second later, Beta’s mind was made up for him.

“I’m coming, Gull!” He yelled while charging forward, barrelling straight through a Psion that had thought – for some reason – to stand in the Titan’s path while shooting him.

“You thought about it.” Copperhead deadpanned as Beta pulled out his shotgun and began blasting several Legionnaires in the back.

“Wh- Beta, go- go away!” Gull growled in an irked, annoyed tone just as he lobbed a swarm grenade high into the air from behind the wing fragment. “I’ve got this!” The grenade hit the ground a couple seconds later, unleashing its mass of seeking explosives on the Cabal.

Unfortunately, the individual seekers did little against the large number of Legionnaires and Centurions when spread out amongst them. Some barely flinched when the seeker struck them while others staggered slightly, but none were brought down by them. _Fortunately_ , the distraction gave Beta the time he needed to pick off the tougher, meaner-looking Cabal with his shotgun before finishing off a large number of Legionnaires through a combination of his fists and spraying them with dozens of poorly placed bullets.

When the Phalanxes began closing in on him, Gull peeked out of cover just in time to take them down with precise bursts from his pulse rifle – Beta’s ‘spray-n-pray’ tactics massively ineffective against their impenetrable shields.

As the immediate danger passed, Gull slumped against the broken gunship wing and brought up one of his legs, reaching out to massage it with his free hand. “I think I sprained my…everything.”

“Oh, man. You did _not_ have it, Gull.” Copperhead chided with a humourless chuckle.

“No, looks like I didn’t.” He murmured while switching legs to twist the other foot until something gave a crack. “So, thanks.”

“S’okay,” Beta waved off while picking up a blue engram off the body of a Centurion. “What’re friends for if we’re not helping each other – and collecting shinies together.”

Gull looked as if he was about to reply, but a sudden burst of noise over the communicator cut him off. “Guardians, if you’re not too busy, I think the Cabal have picked up on what we’re doing.” The growing roar of several engines drew the Titan’s attention to a squadron of Harvesters circling around overhead, slowing to a stop above the ruined, smouldering remains of an anti-air cannon. The side doors to each Harvester slid open as they descended, each releasing a garrison of Cabal soldiers that immediately began marching towards Beta and Gull.

“Uh, we’re a little pre-occupied here, but we’ll hear your request.” Copperhead said in reply for Beta. “Don’t just stand there you two, shoot something.”

“Well whatever you’re dealing with can’t be worse than what I’ve got so-” a sound like thunder burst over Mira’s end, drowning out all other noise as Beta redirected his attention on the Cabal shooting at him.

“Mira, say again? You’ve got a lot of interference.” Gull grunted into his communicator while taking cover behind a signal antenna built into the roof. When all the Cabal soldiers had dropped out of the gunships, the Harvesters accelerated towards them to launch an air strike. Fortunately, only one survived as the remaining anti-air turrets blew the others apart with railgun rounds, pulling away as the turrets began firing on it.

“I see why they designed such strong glass now.” They heard Mira mutter to herself before speaking to them again. “They know I’m in here and they’re sending Harvesters to take out the tower.” The sound of a rocket being launched could briefly be heard from the Warlock’s side of the frequency, followed by an explosion. “I can take care of myself, but if those guns managed to topple the tower…”

The two Guardians looked up when they heard the whine of a damaged Harvester plummeting towards them. Judging by the smoke trail it left behind, it was easy enough to guess that the gunship had been hovering around the top of the communications tower – shot down by Mira when it passed by the broken window. The Harvester crashed a few metres away from them, turning over itself several times before stopping in a fiery, smouldering heap.

At the same time, two more Harvesters appeared from around the tower, firing at different points as their altitudes changed rapidly to keep them mobile and to reach different target points.

“Alright, I’ll be on it in a second.” Gull replied before dropping to one knee and switching out his rifle for his machine gun. Reaching into a sleeve on his lower back, the Hunter pulled out a heavy ammo synth – hesitating as his finger ghosted over the activation button. “Last one…” He muttered to himself, too quiet for Beta to hear anything else as he thumbed it and materialised two ammunition drums.

“Uh, Gull, I don’t think you’re game is good enough to shoot down those metal birdies with that.” Beta pointed out hesitantly while ducking to avoid getting shot.

“I won’t be able to shoot them down, but at least I’ll be able to draw them away.” Gull explained while loading his machine gun. “I need _you_ to keep the rest of the Cabal ground forces busy while I do that, ok?”

“Uh…” Beta drew out the syllable for about five seconds before a shot that struck the ground near his foot caused him to flinch and for his mouth to blurt out a response. “Maybe?”

“Good enough for me.” Gull grunted before springing to his feet and taking off at a sprint – firing as he ran by the garrison of Cabal soldiers, managing to drop a few in the process.

“Did he just…I can’t believe he just left us.” Copperhead exclaimed as Beta backpedalled away from the Cabal, slowly leading them in the opposite direction to Gull.

“It’s fine, Copperhead, we can do this ourselves.” Beta said while reloading his rifle. “All we have to do is…wait, what are we supposed to be doing again?”

Just as Beta finished reloading, a nearby explosion rocked the whole Shipbase. Turning in the direction of the explosion, Beta found the source to be another turret going up in flames.

“Protect the turrets!” the Ghost cried. “There’s only two left, if those go we’ll be dealing with the full force of their air support.”

“O-ok, I can do that, I just…um,” Beta began looking about frantically as his mind raced, panic and anxiety setting in as he stood right in the centre of enemy crossfire with no one to help him. Most of the rounds coming his way did not actually manage to hit him, but with all the enemies in sight, it was getting hard to focus on where he could retreat. “Oh, man. That’s a lot of baddies.”

“Beta, calm down for a second before we…Beta, watch out!” Copperhead’s warning came a second too late as a Centurion dove down on Beta using its jump jets. The fist that made contact with the Exo’s head threw him to the ground and sent him skidding for a few feet before stopping, motionless.

Copperhead materialised by Beta’s side – out of sight of the Cabal by staying at eye-level with his Guardian. “C’mon, Beta. Get up.” The Ghost only got a low groan of pain in reply. “We don’t have time for lying down, and I know you can take more than one sucker punch – get up!”

Suddenly, the fingers on Beta’s right hand began curling and uncurling as it inched towards his auto rifle. A small twitch of the Exo’s metal eyebrow was all Copperhead needed to let out a sigh of relief – his Guardian was still here.

That relief was quickly replaced by worry when Beta opened his eyes. Instead of meeting the familiar blue eyes of his Guardian, the Ghost looked into two cold, dark-purple eyes. “Beta?”

“Beta’s not here right now.” The Exo replied in a slightly deeper voice as his hand found the grip of his rifle.

“Oh, no.” The Ghost sighed in what sounded like defeat before vanishing, just as the Titan rolled about and flung his rifle at the approaching Centurion. Then, at breakneck speeds, he got up and sprinted over to the Cabal officer just as the rifle struck its head.

The Centurion staggered backwards while Beta grabbed his rifle out of the air, bringing its stock down on the Centurion’s gut so hard it left a dent in the armour. When it doubled over, the Exo stuck the barrel of his rifle up the Centurion’s neck and fired four rounds.

He kicked the corpse away with a cold look in his eyes before turning towards an approaching group of Phalanxes. Planting their shields down a good distance away, the Phalanxes fired from behind cover in a wide spread. Undeterred, the Titan stowed his rifle and took off at a sprint towards them, closing the ten-metre distance in under two seconds before vaulting over the Phalanx in the middle – using his jump pack to boost his leap height. At the peak of his jump, the Titan primed a flash grenade and stuck it to the back of the Phalanx.

The squad of Cabal infantry could not react in time as the grenade went off, blinding all three of them as Beta landed and turned to face them. Marching up to the closest one, the Titan threw a lightning-charged punch in the side of its knee and forcing it to buckle as he brought both hands together and slammed them down on the back of its neck.

The next Phalanx to follow tried flailing wildly as its eyesight readjusted, but the Exo easily avoided each swing before getting under its guard and delivering an uppercut that made it stumble backwards while he brought out his shotgun and fired at point-blank range. The last one was felled similarly as Beta aimed for its head, killing it with one shot.

“Look out!” Copperhead cried, which the Striker responded to by rolling out of the way just as a psionic blast barrelled through where he had just stood. Turning to face his next opponents, Beta saw a squad of Psions and Legionnaires led by a pair of Centurions.

Cocking his shotgun, the Titan sprinted to meet the approaching wall of combatants, intent on dispatching them with the same lethal efficiency. The Striker was a blur of movement and gunfire as he blasted through any Cabal he saw, attacking so quickly that most of the Cabal infantry he defeated barely fired a single shot before their body hit the ground.

Though the way he cut through the Cabal line seemed erratic, Beta was actually inching his way towards one of the two remaining fifteen-foot tall anti-air guns as best he could. When he finally got within effective range, Beta saw that the Cabal bomb squad had already laid out their explosives along where the gun received munition. With a grunt of effort, Beta removed the helmet of a downed Legionnaire and hurled it at the Centurion in charge of detonation, catching his attention while the Titan checked on the remaining ammo in his shotgun.

_Empty_ , he noted while switching back to his auto rifle and charging their way. He targeted the ones furthest away from him first, firing in quick bursts that took their heads off as he closed the distance. Then, with a surge of speed thanks to the Arc energy he had been building up in his run, Beta threw his weight into the lead Centurion and pushed it off its feet, continuing to drive it backwards until they both slammed into the cannon.

The Cabal commander smacked its big, heavy fists down on Beta’s back repeatedly, making his servos cry out in pain as he reached around the Centurion to try and grab one of the explosives stuck to the cannon. A final smack left a dent in the back of Beta’s armour before he finally disengaged with a roll, removing the explosive charge as he did and sticking it to the Centurion’s chest.

Distracted by the bomb stuck to its front, the Centurion offered little resistance as Beta dug his fingers in the top and bottom of its front armour plate, hoisting the 800-pound goliath like a battering ram and tossing it towards the rest of its squad – which has been standing by for a clear shot at the Guardian.

Beta fired faster: before their aim became too concentrated, the Titan brought his auto rifle to bear on the explosive strapped to the Centurion. Two quick bursts was all it took to set it off, catching the rest of the demolition squad in the explosion.

With his gun still up, Beta looked on at the explosion for a couple more seconds to make sure it had killed them all. When he was satisfied by the lack of movement, he held up a hand to summon Copperhead and waved him over to the charges still stuck to the cannon – thrumming away with each shot it fired. “See about disarming the rest of those. I’ll keep you covered.”

Copperhead went about his job without saying anything – there was nothing _to_ say to Beta in this state. _All I’m gonna get is the silent treatment, or vague monosyllable replies,_ Copperhead thought to himself while running some scans on the explosive charges.

The Ghost had just begun defusing the first bomb when Gull’s voice broke out over the comms. “Heads up, Beta! I’m coming to you and I’ve got a squadron of Harvesters on me.”

“A squadr- the hell did you do to piss off a whole squadron?” Copperhead exclaimed in alarm.

“Shot at all of them. It’s surprisingly easy to get the Cabal to hate you.” Gull replied just as came into view from around a ruined turret a few metres away. Not far behind him, four Cabal gunships sped out from behind clouds of smoke billowing from the roof of the shipyard – keeping in a tight formation as they chased the Hunter down.

Though they had the advantage when it came to firepower and numbers, Gull managed to stay a few metres ahead of them and out of their effective firing range as micro-missiles rained down in the path he cut.

As soon as he caught sight of them, Beta dropped to one knee and took aim with his auto rifle, firing in short bursts as the Harvesters got closer. His shots did little against the reinforced hull of the gunships, but that soon changed when the anti-air turret behind him turned to fire on the squadron, the automatic targeting computer having taken notice of the fighters.

A shot rang out that shook Beta’s skeletal frame as the cannon fired a round that tore through one of the Harvesters, blowing it to pieces and only leaving bits of debris that fell to the ground. The other Harvesters managed to pull away before the turret fired again, but Beta could tell from the wide arc they were making that they were circling back around.

Gull slowed to a stop next to Beta as his eyes trailed after the Harvesters. “They’re coming back for another run, and the turret doesn’t have the rate of fire to pick them all off.”

The Hunter turned to face Beta, likely surprised by the seriousness and slight edge of his tone, before responding. “I’ve got a Golden Gun ready, but it’ll take two direct hits to even bring one down.”

Looking about, Beta began considering options before his eyes landed on the charges still stuck to the turret. Stepping back to pull another off the side of the turret, he held it out to Copperhead. “Ghost, set the timer on this thing: five seconds.”

Copperhead gave Beta a look of shock and bewilderment that he knew Gull shared before steeling himself and scanning the bomb. “Yeah, got it.”

“Here they come!” Gull announced while summoning his flaming Solar pistol. His aim held steady as the turret turned to fire at the gunships. The first shot missed its mark as the Harvesters began dodging left and right. The next two shots similarly missed their mark, before the fourth collided with the lead Harvester, causing it to plummet out of the sky.

The Gunslinger took that as his cue to open fire, popping off a shot immediately that struck one of the remaining Harvesters in the wing before pausing to adjust his aim. A second later, the next shot struck the same spot as the first, causing the metal of the wing to superheat and melt off, sending the gunship careening into the ground below.

When Gull fired his last shot, however, the round missed by a hair’s breadth and left a trail that led all the way into Deimos’ lower orbit. Cursing to himself as the Golden Gun faded away, the Hunter drew his fusion rifle and took a few steps back as Beta stepped up to take his place.

“Ghost, anytime now.” Beta urged; his hand still outstretched for Copperhead to reset the timer on the bomb.

“Done!” As soon as the bronze Ghost chirped his affirmation, the Titan’s arm curled backwards as his free arm stretched outwards to help him aim.

The Harvester was only a few dozen metres away now as it descended to get under the anti-air turret’s range, its weapons primed and ready to fire. Beta waited two seconds before snapping his arm forward, hurling the live explosive at the approaching gunship like a stone.

If Copperhead could breathe, he would have held his breath as he watched the explosive fly through the air while the gunship sped towards it, unable to correct its course now that the airborne charge was so close to it.

Two rockets were launched out of the Harvester right before the explosive went off, detonating in a fiery cloud inches from the front of the gunship. The rockets went wide and only managed to strike the ground around the two Guardians as they watched the gunship lose altitude.

The explosion took off a better part of the ship’s front and underbelly when it tried to make a complete stop. Now it was spinning out of control in its rapid descent towards the roof of the Shipbase. Just before it lost engine power, however, it fired a single rocket headed straight for them.

_No,_ Copperhead realised. _Not at us_. Turning around, he looked at the collection of explosives still stuck to the side of the turret – still active.

“Run!” he yelled before dematerialising, spurring Beta into action immediately as the Titan took off at a sprint. Gull took a second longer to recognise the danger before taking off in the same direction as Beta, just as the missile zipped by and struck the explosives.

A second and third explosion went off as something caused a chain reaction in the shipyard, causing the roof of break apart as the explosions blew apart large portions of its support structure and a series of small fireballs burst to life through the roof. The Exo had the good fortune of outrunning the effects of the explosion, slowing down when the ground under him didn’t feel like it was going to fall away.

When he turned around, Beta found that Gull was not as lucky. A few metres away from stable footing, the plate Gull was standing on broke free of its supports and tumbled down into the recesses of the shipyard – with the Human still standing on it.

Reflexively, the Titan reached out a hand as he called out the Gunslingers name. He stood there for a moment, on the edge of the large hole that had formed in the roof, his eyes flickering between purple and blue before holding steady on their regular bright-blue colour.

“Beta…there’s nothing we can do for him,” Copperhead murmured in his ear as the Titan dropped his arm in defeat. “Right now we’ve got bigger fish to fry. We’ll go looking for him before we le- oh, shit!” in no time at all, Copperhead’s tone changed from one intended to comfort the Exo to one of alarm.

Beta did not immediately register the change in tone, but began looking around when a large shadow suddenly shrouded the area. Glancing up at the sky, the Titan felt his jaw drop when he saw the massive ship blotting out part of the distant sun. It was on an approach vector, as apparent by the way it got bigger as the seconds passed by, and in a few minutes it would be right on top of the base.

“…Is that the-”

“Yup.” Copperhead replied just as a squadron of Harvesters flew overhead, returning to the Carrier along with the dozens of other craft intending to get out of the blast zone.

“Time to panic?”

“Yup.”


	14. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With seconds left, Mira Vuul has to make a decision that could mean life or death not just for herself, but for her fellow Guardians and The Last City.
> 
> Meanwhile, Beta and Copperhead have their own choice to make: search for Gull, or save themselves.

**Central Communication Tower, Shipbase Metus, Deimos, in orbit around Mars…**

_This isn’t good,_ Mira thought to herself while trying to track the Cabal Carrier’s rapid descent – a datascreen in one hand as she sifted through two lines of coded signal at the same time, and her Ghost in the other while she used it as a makeshift holo-projector.

Floating in the air a few inches above it was the real-time projection of Deimos, with Mars’ northern hemisphere in the background. On it, a single red dot meant to represent the Carrier inched its way closer and closer to a point on Deimos: Shipbase Metus.

“It must be the latency of our connection. Without a proper laser guidance system, we just can’t communicate with the targeting computer in the anti-matter cannon fast enough.” Her Ghost explained while Mira continued to crush her thumb against buttons on the datascreen, sending off new signals and instructions to the Golden Age targeting computer on Mars. At the same time, a white line meant to represent the surface-to-orbit gun’s line of fire made miniscule adjustments on Mira’s holo-projections, constantly trying to align itself with the Carrier.

“How much time until they’re within range of bombardment?” Mira asked while her right hand left the datascreen for a second to parse additional telemetry to her Ghost, hoping to plot the Carrier’s flight trajectory.

“Another eighty-five seconds.” The Ghost replied. _Damn, that’s too close._ “Though they should be close enough to start launchi-” before the spark of Light had a chance to finish, a violent explosion rocked the whole tower, causing it to tilt to one side. “Ballistic missiles.”

“At this rate they’re going to destroy the dish before I can even send the order to fire.” Growling under her breath, the Sunsinger abandoned the console and walked over to one of the windows, where the Carrier now loomed in the overhead view. “What are our chances of hitting the quantum well generator with the signal data from the dish?” she directed her question at her Ghost.

“Dead on? Around thirty-two percent.”

Mira juggled between ideas and solutions in her mind for a couple of seconds before speaking again. “What are our chances of making a shot through visual line-of-sight?”

“Uh, less than twelve, so don’t even think about it.”

“Well it might be our only chance at hitting the Carrier before it’s directly over us, so I’ll think about it.” Mira shot back before falling back into a second of silence. Then, the spark of idea crackled in her mind. “Wait, I’ve got it!”

“I think I have an idea, too.” Her Ghost flew around to the console to activate its miniature holo-projector.

Despite the situation, a small smirk developed on Mira’s face. “Perchance, do you think we just had the same idea?”

The Ghost’s voice held hints of a smile as it interfaced with the console to bring up a projection of the space around the shipyard. “Depends if your idea was to predict the Carrier’s approach vector based on where it is and where it’s going.”

“Then line up the cannon along its approach corridor-” Mira continued.

“So that it’ll fly right into firing range-”

“And all we have to do is pull the trigger once it’s lined up!” The Warlock finished, just about ready to pull her Ghost into an excited embrace.

A few seconds passed in silence as Mira’s Ghost altered the projection to account for the Carrier, where it was most likely to stop over the shipyard and where the anti-matter round will punch through it. “It could work, and it raises the chances of a direct hit up to sixty-two percent, but it leaves us with a _very_ narrow exit window.”

“How narrow?” Mira asked as she watched a warhead plummet down from the Carrier and strike the landing strip at the front of the Shipbase.

“We’ll have to wait until the Carrier is almost directly over us – three seconds from direct bombardment position.” The Ghost responded in a calm voice as the projection changed to show where the Carrier would be as it closed in on the shipyard.

 _Damn, that’s even closer._ Chewing her bottom lip in frustration, Mira ran the options they had in her head. _We can’t just wait until they’re close enough to fire. Hell, the communications tower might not still be standing by the time they’re in position. We’ll need to…_

Then it hit her. “Ghost, transmit the new firing solution to the cannon and give it the order to fire.”

“What, Mira? If we fire now-” Her Ghost started to argue.

“No, not now. Send a command to fire on a timer. Sync it to the Carrier’s predicted arrival time and time it to fire three-point-four-six-seven-five seconds before they’re in position to bomb this place.” Her Ghost hesitated for a second, giving her a look that resembled the quirked eyebrows of other confused Guardians and Tower staff when she gave them very specific information. “I calculated the time it would take for the round to travel here. If we can, we should always try to be precise.”

“Alright…” The Ghost hesitantly replied. “But it’ll still reduce the chances of a direct hit by-”

Another large explosion rocked the signal tower, causing it to tilt even further and for some of the mechanical arms holding up the datascreens to go slack. “I don’t care!” she snapped at her Ghost, urgency in her tone. “We don’t have time and we might not get another chance to send a signal.” Everything around them gave another pained groan as the room began slanting even more, the lights and datascreens around them flickering briefly. “We could lose power at any moment.” Mira thought aloud as she observed and assessed their situation.

“Ok-- yeah, I’ll get on it,” A ray of light shone from the Ghost’s eye as it interfaced with the main console. “You make sure we have an exit plan.”

“I’m already working on it.” Mira said absentmindedly as she turned on the spot, taking stock of the situation and working through all their options as another explosion rocked the whole facility.

_No chance of getting out the way we came in…perhaps if we rode the tower’s momentum as it falls…no, too many unknown and uncontrollable variables. That leaves…_

“Ok, it’s done,” her Ghost chirped, interrupting the Warlock’s thoughts. “The antimatter cannon is aligned and will fire in approximately twenty-four se-- conds!” it exclaimed the last syllable as Mira suddenly grabbed it out of the air and tucked it close to her chest.

With her Ghost in her grasp, Mira ran against the incline of the tilting tower with a fresh solar grenade in her other hand. Thumbing the primer on the grenade, she thrust it against the fibreglass window – now cracked from the constant missile barrage of Harvesters, pushing it as far as she could as it superheated and melted part of the glass in the few seconds before it exploded.

At the last second, Mira took a step back as the grenade exploded and tore the window apart, spraying her with glass fragments of varying size before she walked over to the new opening in the tower and stared at the shipyard’s roof far below – now pocketed with explosion craters.

“Call up the ship; high-speed intercept course.” She told her Ghost while taking a couple steps backwards.

“Intercept course?” Its voice was muffled from where Mira kept it tucked against her chest. “What is it intercepting?”

“Us.” Mira’s voice wavered briefly as she swallowed her fears and steeled her nerves. As the tower began tilting further, the Warlock took off at a sprint towards the opening in the glass.

“Mira-- wait! No, no no—no!” her Ghost cried as she leapt out of the opening, arms spread wide in freefall just as a stray ballistic missile sailed above her and struck the dish atop the signal tower, causing it to break free of its supports and tear away.

The ground was fast approaching as Mira kept her gaze fixed downwards, refusing to look anywhere else. “Ghost…”

“Hang on, it’s coming in hot!” the Ghost warned as Mira tried to pick out the sound of her jumpship’s engines over the roar of missiles, explosions and evacuating Cabal vessels. It was worrying that she couldn’t find them as the ground grew closer.

At this height, she would surely be dead upon impact.

And there would be no way to get off-world in time.

“Ghost!” her pitch jumped a few octaves as every nerve and instinct in her body urged her to trigger a glide and cut her losses at a pair of broken legs.

“On your right!” the Ghost yelled just as the familiar wail of her modified drive core reached her ears, along with a rush of compressed air that hit her nearly as hard as the ‘Laughing Behind Your Back’ did when it flew straight into the falling Warlock.

Or, at least, it should have if her Ghost had not transmatted her into the ship’s cockpit at the last second. Mira felt the wind leave her lungs as she fell into her pilot’s seat with the same momentum she had when she was free-falling, but the Sunsinger recovered quickly as her hands found the controls and immediately switched the flight systems back to manual.

“Next time a little heads-up in advance would be appreciated.” Her Ghost chided as Mira rolled the ship to one side to avoid an oncoming missile. “Y’know, so next time I can have the ship ready to catch us in time before we end up splattered all over this nice Cabal installation.”

“I’ll keep it in mind for future reference,” The cobalt-haired Awoken breathed out as she reached up with one hand to pull her helmet off, taking her first breath of non-mask-filtered air since leaving Earth. She took a second to shake her helmet hair out before taking a sharp right to avoid a seeking missile. “How long left before the cannon fires?”

The Ghost winced as it watched Mira narrowly make a tight loop around the missile and destroy it with a quick spray of high-impact tungsten rounds. “Another eighteen seconds. We’d best get ready for warp as soon as it goes off, because it’s not going to do enough damage to render the Carrier incapacitated.”

“Not just yet,” Mira mumbled as she pulled her jumpship into a steady turn, circling the roof of the Shipbase. “There are still two Guardians down there, and I’m not leaving until I’m sure they can’t be saved.”

“Huh,” her Ghost exclaimed as she flew towards the point on her navigator that tracked Copperhead. “I didn’t realised you cared so much, especially since we haven’t even spent that much time with them.”

Ignoring her Ghost’s comment, Mira opened up a communication’s patch through her ship to the Titan’s Ghost. “Copperhead, Beta, the cannon’s aimed and primed to fire in less than fifteen seconds. Call your jumpship down and be ready to warp as soon as the Carrier takes the hit.” She passed by close enough to see the Titan standing by the edge of a large hole in the roof – alone. “And pass the message on to Gull, I’m not picking him or his Ghost up on my scanners.”

After she finished saying what she wanted to, Mira reduced the speed on her thrusters and angled the nose of her ship upwards, prepared to push her ship’s engines to maximum and slip by the Cabal warship as soon as the antimatter projectile hit it. As things were, the Warlock stood little to no chance of outmanoeuvring the Carrier’s guided weapon systems, but Mira hoped that the ‘surprise’ she was sending their way would be enough to overwhelm the ship’s sensors and systems, and throw the on-board crew into a panic long enough for her and the other two Guardians to slip by.

However, before she could push her thrusters into a steady ascent, Beta’s voice broke out over the communications line. “Uh, yeah, about that…”

Mira felt her fingers tense up over the throttle stick as her expression tightened. “Beta, what is it?”

“It’s…Gull.” The Warlock could _hear_ the sheepish expression on the Exo’s face. “Um…yeah, he’s gone.”

* * *

“What do you mean he _fell_?” Mira’s voice sounded somewhere between a shout and a snarl to Copperhead, the Ghost cringing when she effectively growled out the end of the sentence.

“I mean he fell! There was an explosion, the ground collapsed out from under him and he fell straight down into…looks like the repair bay down there. Now he’s…somewhere in the guts of the shipyard-- I’m not sure, it’s like a dark, bottomless pit down there.” Copperhead rambled as he stared down the spot where the Hunter had fallen.

The Warlock hesitated for a second before continuing. “Can you see him?”

“No, I just said it’s like a dark-”

“Are you picking up him or his Ghost on your sensors?” Mira cut him off, firing her next question like a burst from a pulse rifle.

This time, Copperhead was the one to hesitate as he ran his scan for Light signatures once more. Unfortunately, even _if_ Gull was alive, the Guardian and his Ghost were too far out of his detection range to pick up.

Which meant there was no way of knowing if he was still kicking, fighting to return to them, or if he was dead and awaiting resurrection.

“No, which means he’s either too far away for us to reach or…” Copperhead dreaded the alternative, knowing what the loss of a Guardian and their Ghost meant to this never-ending war, and their survival.

“Understood,” Mira’s tone was solemn as she let the word hang in the air for a few seconds before speaking again. “Meet me in Deimos’ upper orbit in two minutes. I’ll be making the jump back to Earth whether you’re there or not.”

 The Ghost was surprised by how quick she was to dismiss Gull’s life, and it showed in his words. “Wh-- Mira, we can’t just-” before he got a chance to finish his plea with the Warlock, however, a blinding light crossed the sky and replaced the dark, dusty brown of Deimos’ thin atmosphere with a bright, pale-blue glare. For a second, the whole moon was just that blinding blue glare in the sky.

And then, a rippling boom like a bomb blowing up a dozen other bombs, all strapped to the fuel tank of a rocket ship tore through the sky and shook the shipyard.

After a few passing seconds, the glaring light in the sky – centralised around the Carrier – began to fade, allowing Copperhead and Beta a better view of what the Ghost realised to be the antimatter round from the surface-to-orbit cannon on Mars slamming into the Carrier. When he looked directly at the source of the fading light, Copperhead found himself speechless by the sight.

Through the back half of the Carrier, a large hole that went through the entire ship showed where the superheated, unstable antimatter round penetrated the ship. A trail of white charged particles and anti-material essence that hung in the void of space showed where the shot had come from, and where it had exited the ship before deteriorating in empty space.

From what he had learnt about these Golden Age defences, Copperhead knew that the payload fired from the cannon was around the size of Beta’s arm or a rocket launcher, but just from his initial estimates the hole it left in the sides of the Cabal warship had to be at least a dozen meters in diameter. He knew it was because of the way the payload was designed; to allow the antimatter to expand the longer it was exposed to matter and allowed to destabilise as it travelled. It was different seeing the destructive power of what had to be half a pound of antimatter warhead in action over just reading the theory behind it.

The sizable hole it left through the Carrier was still glowing white from the immense heat of the charged round, and for a moment it was as if everything had gone silent and time had slowed to a crawl. The warship’s approach had slowed drastically after it had been hit, and Beta could see smoke rising in slow motion from several of the engines, a sign that they were either losing power or had blown out due to a ruptured fuel line.

Suddenly, time seemed to catch up with what had happened as another explosion blossomed out from the Carrier’s port side. Copperhead then saw the opportunity presenting itself before them as the Carrier dipped down rapidly from loss of stabilisation.

“Yes, it worked,” they heard Mira announce over the channel, sounding more like she was talking to herself than directing the statement at them. “The gravity field is dropping. Preparing for warp back to Earth now.”

Copperhead turned his attention to his Guardian. “Beta,” he urged the Titan gently. “We have to go.”

Beta turned to his Ghost with a devastated expression. “But, what about-”

“We’ll come back for Gull later, I promise,” The Ghost darted closer to the Titan to create _some_ sense of emotional closeness. “Right now, we might not get a better chance of getting out of here. And if we stay we…”

“But…what if Gull’s not here when we get back?” Beta asked, the metal plating around his mouth pulling into a frown.

Copperhead was about to reply when the sound of metal sheets folding against one another reached him. Looking up, he saw that the Carrier was now directly above them, and the shutters on its underbelly were retracting open, revealing their contents: hundreds of bombs and explosives.

Enough to level the Shipbase, as they intended to do from the start.

Turning back to his Guardian, Copperhead gave him a forlorn look as their jumpship, a bulky gold-painted cargo ship with twin engines as large as the ship’s main body, gifted to them by Lord Saladin – the words “Birth of History” cut alongside the left engine, approached them and slowed to a hover nearby. “I’m sorry, Beta.”

With that, both Copperhead and Beta vanished in a flash of light into the ship’s cockpit and quickly climbed in altitude to escape the coming bombardment.

* * *

For a while, all Gull could think of or feel was a heavy numbness all over his body, making his arms, feet and mind feel like they were weighed down by anchors. Anchors that sucked the strength right out of him. No part of his body responded to his commands to move, though Gull was not even sure if his mind was telling them to move in the first place.

Then all of a sudden, every sensation and sense came back to him like a shock to his system.

Immediately, Gull felt a dull pain throughout his body and a weight on his back keeping him pinned to the floor. Sucking in a breath of air through his teeth, the Hunter took a second to realise that the display in his helmet was not on, which only served to leave him blind in his dark surroundings.

Gull quickly wriggled an arm out from under him to smack the side of his helmet, knocking something into place after the third hit and reactivating the helmet display. The lights came on both inside and outside of the helmet. After a quick visual sweep to confirm that he was, _in fact,_ pinned to the floor by a pile of metal plates, beams and debris, Gull called out into the dark.

“Ghost!” he shouted.

“I’m still here, Gull.” The Ghost replied over the Hunter’s communicator.

With a sigh of relief, Gull started to dig his elbows and wrists against the ground to crawl out from under the rubble. “What happened? Where are we?”

“My best guess is a power or fuel line under the roof ruptured and sent us down one of the deep, bottomless pits that the Cabal just _love_ to build in their buildings.” The Ghost replied with a tone of snarky frustration. “As for where we are, well, I suppose those pits aren’t bottomless after all – otherwise we’d still be falling.”

“Ghost…”

“I’m joking. According to the map Mira pulled from the systems, it seems we’re in the lower levels of the shipyard; where they process raw materials into metals and such that they use to build and repair ships,” The Spark rambled while Gull aimlessly felt along the ground with his free hand for a handhold or something to hold the rubble up. “I can chart us a way back to the surface, but given Mira’s ETA on the Carrier’s arrival I don’t think we’ll make it in time.”

Gull’s luck eventually held out when his fingers found a dented ferro-steel beam double the length of his knife at the edge of his reach. “Call up the ship. Find a way for it into the base – I don’t care if it has to make one.” He grunted while wedging the beam under the metal plate on top of him, which managed to hold the loose structure high enough that Gull could use both his hands to crawling out from under it. “If we can’t get to it, we make it come to us – we are _not_ dying down here.”

The rubble above him suddenly began to shift when Gull managed to crawl out far enough that he could move his legs. As loose pieces of metal and polymer material began tumbling and falling around him, the Gunslinger found a solid grip on a small pit in the floor and pulled himself the rest of the way out with one hard pull, skidding across the ground as the debris pile crumbled behind him.

“Huh, that’s curious.” His Ghost exclaimed as the Gunslinger pushed himself to his feet, dusting himself off before surveying his surroundings.

“What is?” he asked, glancing around aimlessly in the dark.

“I’m pinging the ship’s locator signal but…it’s responding from down here.” As it spoke, the Ghost shone a beam of light out of its eye.

“What, _here_ here? Does that mean-”

“It’s down here with us,” the Ghost chimed in an elated tone as its light turned upwards. “Riiiight…there!” a few metres above their heads – hanging by several carbon-fibre cables attached with magnetic locks – the Spark’s light reflected off a dirty-bronze metal form. Cast in deep shadows by the darkness, it took Gull a second to recognise the metal object as his jumpship.

 “I’ll be damned,” Gull breathed out as a smile crossed his face. _Maybe our luck’s finally turning around_. Another thought crossed his mind then that made him furrow his eyebrows. “Wait, what’s it doing down here? Didn’t we land it on the main airstrip?”

“Well, if it’s down here it probably means the Cabal were going to melt it down for salvage.”

“Not anymore, they’re not.” Gull growled as he raised his pulse rifle and took aim at the metal cables holding the ship in the air. Three quick bursts from the rifle caused three of the cables to snap, tilting the jumpship to one side as the remaining cables struggled to bear its weight. A couple of seconds later, two of the cables gave a pained groan before breaking, the others following soon after as the _Rope to Heaven_ fell the short distance it took to reach the ground, crashing loudly among the scraps of polymer material and metal scattered about.

“Ooh, that’s probably going to scratch the paint,” the Ghost remarked with what looked like a wince. “And probably damage the landing gear. Should’ve started it up before you cut it loose.”

“No time for that.” Slinging his pulse rifle onto his back, the Hunter quickly crawled along the ship’s front before hitting the automatic release on the cockpit window and climbing in. Once seated, his hands worked with familiar instruments. “Ghost, I’m going to go through the pre-flight checks while you plot us a way out of here.”

He had barely hit the power switch before a series of explosions rocked the whole facility, causing loose debris and scrap to rain down on the cockpit’s canopy.

“Now, Ghost - find us a way out of here, right now!” Gull started yelling as his hands flew over the buttons on the flight controls twice as fast as they normally would.

“A waypoint’s not going to help if we’re not in the air,” The Ghost shot back. “The yelling doesn’t help, either.”

“Sorry,” he muttered as his left hand found the handle for the vertical thrusters, slamming it down to full power as the heads-up-display lit up at the same time as the forward lights. The light interceptor suddenly jerked upwards with the engines as the ship’s computer took a second to scan the environment’s layout before a curved white line appeared on the display, as well as a waypoint marker.

“Ok, that’s our way out,” The Ghost stated as it vanished to give Gull more room to work with. “Try to take it slow; the building’s coming down around us and we’ll be flying close to-”

The Gunslinger didn’t wait for his Ghost to finish as the shipyard’s lower levels shook ferociously, slamming on the thrusters and following the line on the display. Almost immediately, Gull narrowly missed flying into a wall that he had not seen because of the low lighting.

“A lot of-- sharp turns!” The Spark finished as Gull took the ship up and through an opening in the roof, flying through several floors with ease before debris from higher up began falling towards them – blocking their path in some areas.

“Whoa, Gull—we’re way off course! You need to…oh, nevermind. A new path just opened up.”

“Sorry if I’m not following your flight plan,” Gull apologised half-heartedly as he suddenly diverted all power to the vertical thrusters and angled the ship so that its belly faced a ruptured fuel line that was quickly burning up. “But I’m going with my gut this time.”

“Yeah, no. Just go with your gut. Saves me the trouble of recalculating our escape vector every two seconds.” More than halfway up the building’s structure, it became harder to manoeuvre the Kestrel-class interceptor as the floors, ceilings and walls crumbled around them, bits of everything exploding in showers of shrapnel as Gull finally managed to get to the central shaft, where repaired ships were sent up to the surface for redeployment. “The way I see it, our only chance of making it out is with a _lot_ of improvisation. I mean, it’s either that or your improvising gets us killed spectacularly.”

“You just might get your wish for the latter; the bay doors are still shut.” Gull pointed out as he powered up the ship’s afterburners, flying straight up towards the sealed metal doors.

“Uh, that’s not good. That’s our only clear way out of here. All the other exits I’m picking up are either too narrow or too unstable to chance.”

“Well then, I guess we’ve got to improvise again,” Gull stated as his hand went to the controls for the jumpship’s Artemis-type missile launchers, priming every missile to fire. “Ghost, I want you to target all missiles on a single point on the doors.”

“That’s not going to work, the door’s too tough. We’ll need twice as many Artemis missiles to make a hole big enough for us to fit through.” The Ghost called out in growing alarm.

With a flick of his thumb, the Hunter flipped open the tab on the flight stick concealing the trigger for the missiles. “We don’t have any other option – or time,” he muttered while narrowing his eyes on a single point on the door. “Lock on target, I’ll fire on one.”

“We are going to die!”

“Five, four-” Then, the central shaft filled with flames before he could count to three.

* * *

Mira’s Ghost counted down to when the warp drive would deactivate, thrusting the Phaeton-class fighter back into real-space over Earth, but the Warlock barely heard it. Her mind was too busy going over the loss of a fellow Guardian on what was supposed to be a covert-op.

 _Her_ covert-op.

It wasn’t supposed to be this complicated; just a reconnaissance mission to assess a threat. _The bloody Hunter just_ had _to stick his gloves into where they didn’t belong, aggravate an entire Cabal fleet and storm a shipyard._ Mira fumed quietly. _And now, thanks to him, the War Cult’s likely going to be under investigation by the Vanguard, maybe even Ikora’s Hidden, not to mention how I’m going to explain to Cayde how Gull’s…how he’s…_

Grunting in frustration, the Sunsinger reached up to pinch the bridge of her nose as she squeezed her eyes shut, deep in concentration. _I can’t believe this is happening._

“Mira?” The Ghost asked, sounding like it was repeating a question. “Shall I plot us a course to the Tower Hangar? I…need to run diagnostics on our weapons and armour for damage.”

“Yes, please do.” She managed to stammer out as her thoughts continued to swirl. “We…It’s likely Lakshmi has already gone to see the Vanguard to report our findings; it would be best if we were present to…clarify her report.” Mira corrected herself at the last second, the instinct to justify and defend the War Cult nearly getting the better of her nature to remain neutral.

A small ripple in space emanated from a spot a few kilometres from where the Warlock’s jumpship drifted a second later. “That’s Beta Tauri’s ship; he’s just exited warp space,” The Ghost informed her. “And it looks like they’re heading down. Should we-”

“Yes, follow behind them. And open up a channel to Beta Tauri’s Ghost.” Mira ordered her own Ghost, who complied with her orders immediately. After a second of silence, the ship’s engines kicked in again at a medium throttle and realigned itself to follow in the wake of the Titan’s gold-plated jumpship as it entered Earth’s atmosphere.

A few seconds later, a light switched on atop Mira’s interface, letting her know that they had established a communications line.

“Copperhead, can you read me?” she asked.

The Ghost replied after a moment’s pause. “Yeah, you’re coming through with a bit of static, but we can hear you.”

“What’s your condition?”

“We’re fine. Took a couple hits on our way out, but nothing a hard buff can’t fix.”

“Any chance you…detected something on your way out?” Mira did not have to say what she was referring to for Copperhead to understand. It was wishful thinking on her part, but her experience had taught her to be thorough.

“No. No, just back and forth chatter on the Cabal networks. Apparently they’d rather bomb their own shipyard and _then_ work out the evacuation plan for their own than let us have it.” Copperhead snickered briefly, but covered it up with a cough.

Normally, Mira’s mind would be leaping at the opportunity they created by causing such destruction in an improvised pre-emptive strike against the Cabal; thinking up battle strategies and considering options to capitalise on the chaos that will likely ensue. Now, however, the only thing going through the Awoken’s mind was the failure of an operation this mission had become.

“Of course. I suppose it was too much to hope for, anyway,” Mira sighed regrettably, allowing the analyst in her to take over. “The chances of a Guardian surviving an orbital bombardment of that magnitude-”

“Hey, we don’t talk like that here.” Copperhead scolded, catching Mira off guard as she noticed Copperhead mute their channel before hailing her with a new one. She accepted the hail without question. “Ok, we’re on a private channel,” the Ghost sighed. “Look, I’d appreciate it if you could at least _pretend_ to be a little optimistic about Gull’s chances around Beta. I promised him we’d go back for Gull once we got help, and I want to at least make the effort before jumping to the worst-case scenario.”

Mira was both intrigued and perplexed by the Ghost’s request. “And why should I deny him the truth?”

“Because you’ll hurt his feelings and I’ll have to deal with the fallout of another emotional episode.” The Ghost shot back before letting out a frustrated groan. “All I’m asking is that you don’t talk about Gull’s chances until _after_ we’ve recovered his Ghost.”

“Funny, you don’t sound too optimistic yourself.” She muttered irritably.

“It’s called being realistic. And realistically, we’ve got worse things to worry about at the present moment, like how the Vanguard’s going to chew us out and toss whatever’s left over the side of the Tower.”

“Doubtlessly.” Mira agreed. “Which is why I’m already compiling a report which, with your help, might be enough to convince the Vanguard that our recklessness was justified.”

There was a couple seconds of silence on the Ghost’s end before Copperhead spoke up again. “Well, I suppose if there’s one thing you Warlocks are good for, it’s writing reports.” The Sunsinger’s eyes narrowed into a dangerous leer at the comment, once again making a mental note of the Ghost’s unusually snide attitude. “And, who knows, maybe we’ll catch Zavala on one of his rare, unusually good moods?”


End file.
